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Addresses and Papers 

of 

Charles Evans Hughes 

Governor of New York 
1906-1908 



With an Introduction by 

Jacob Gould Schurman 

President of Cornell University 



G. P. Putnam's Sons 

New York and London 
Cbe ■ff^ntckcrbocl^er ipress 

1908 



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Two Copiu rttjcx-... 

APR 2b 1908 



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Copyright, 1908 

BY 

G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS 



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PREFACE 

There is no more interesting figure before 
the American pubHc to-day than Charles Evans 
Hughes, Governor of New York. His sudden 
rise into poHtical prominence is one of the most 
hopeful and significant signs of the great 
moral awakening now in progress in the United 
States. Three years ago he was almost un- 
known outside of the legal profession of his 
own State. All over the country people are 
watching his career with eagerness and hope, 
and many of them have come to the conclusion 
that he is worthy of the presidency. But. 
although there is s^eneral confidence in his 
ability and honesty, comparatively little is 
known of his political views, especially on 
national issues. He has wished to be judged 
by his performances and not by his professions, 
consequently the messages and speeches con- 
taining his opinions on the questions of the 
day are buried among official documents or 
lost in the files of the daily papers. Believing 
that Mr. Hup;hes's views should be better 



ii Preface 

known, TJie Independent arranged for the pub- 
lication of the present volume of his letters 
and speeches. This gives the American people 
for the first time an opportunity to study his 
utterances and to form an intelligent opinion 
of his fitness for the high ofifice for which he 
has been sucfofested. President Schurman's 
introduction is reprinted from The Indepc7ide7it 
of December 26, 1907. The material has 
been gathered together by Robert H. Fuller, 
Secretary to the Governor ; and the proofs 
have been read by Gardner Richardson of 
Tke hidcpendent. 

Hamilton Holt, 

Managing Editor of The Independe7it. 



CONTENTS. 

PAGE 

Introductory vii 

By Jacob Gould Schurman, LL.D. 

I. — Public Office and Party Principles. 

I. — Reply to Committee Appointed to Notify 
him of his Nomination for Mayor of 
New York City, October 9, 1905 3 

II. — Speech in Response to Formal Notifi- 
cation of his Nomination as the Re- 
publican Candidate for Governor, at 
the Republican Club, New York City, 
October 3, 1906 9 

III. — Inaugural Address, Albany, N. Y., Jan- 
uary I, 1907 19 

IV. — Speech at the Dinner of the Republican 
Club of the City of New York, October 
18, 1907 24 

V. — Correspondence with James S. Lehmaier 

of New York City 37 

iii 



iv Contents 



FACE 



VI. — Address before the Republican Club of 
the City of New York, January 31, 
1908 40 

VII. — Address at the Union League Club Meet- 
ing in the Auditorium at Chicago, 
Saturday, February' 22, 1908 62 

II. — Regulation of Public-Service Corporations. 

I. — Message to the Legislature, January- 2, 
1907, Recommending the Passage of 
the Public-Sendee Commissions Law 89 

II. — Speech at the Banquet of the Utica 

Chamber of Commerce, April i, 1907 . 100 

III.— Speech at the Glens Falls Club, April 5, 

1907 113 

IV. — Speech at the Banquet of the Buffalo 

Chamber of Commerce, April 18, 1907 126 

V. — Speech before the Elmira Chamber of 

Commerce, May 3, 1907 133 

VI.— Veto of the Two-Cent Fare Bill 147 

III. — Occasional Addresses. 

I. — Speech at the Banquet of the Albany 
Republican Organization, February 
27, 1907 ^57 

II. — Speech at the National Arbitration and 
Peace Congress, New York City, April 

15. 1907 ^63 



Contents v 



PAGB 



III. — Address at the Dedication of the Build- 
ings of the New York State College 
of Agriculture, at Cornell University, 
April 27, 1907 171 

IV. — Address at the Unveiling of Tablets at 
the Hall of Fame, New York Uni- 
versity, May 31, 1907 179 

V. — Address at the Jamestown Exposition on 
Jefferson Memorial Day, July 5, 1907, 
in connection with the Reunion of 
the Descendants of the Signers of the 
Declaration of Independence 190 

VI. — Address at Chautauqua, August 24, 1907 203 

VII. — Speech at the Washington County Fair, 

Sandy Hill, N. Y., August 27, 1907 .. 215 

VIII. — Speech at the Dedication of the Mc- 
Kinley Monument in Buffalo, Septem- 
ber 5, 1907 231 

IX. — Address at the National Encampment 
of the Grand Army of the Republic, 
Saratoga, September 10, 1907 235 

X. — Address at the Dedication of the Monu- 
ment to General Greene at Gettys- 
burg, September 27, 1907 239 

XI. — Speech at the Jamestown Exposition on 

New York Day, October 10, 1907 ... . 243 



vi Contents 



TAGE 



XII. — Address at the Dedication of the Monu- 
ment to General Franz Sigel, New 
York City, October 19, 1907 255 

XIII. — Address at the Charity Organization 
Society, Carnegie Hall, New York 
City, November 19, 1907 263 

XIV. — Speech at the Opening of the Civic Forum 
at Carnegie Hall, New York City, 
November 20, 1907 272 

XV. — Speech at the Meeting in the Interest 
of Tuskegee Institute, Held at Carne- 
gie Hall on the Evening of January' 
17, 1908 284 



1 



INTRODUCTORY 

BY JACOB GOULD SCHURMAN, LL.D. 
PRESIDENT OF CORNELL UNIVERSITY 

In complying with the request of the editor 
of The Inclcpende7it'^ to write an article on 
Governor Hucrhes, I have assumed that what 
is desired is, not an intimate account of his 
personality, but an estimate of his attitude and 
career as a public man. Even for this pur- 
pose, however, a brief sketch of his life will 
prove a helpful introduction. 

Charles Evans Hughes was born at Glens 
Falls, New York, on April ii, 1862. On the 
father's side he is of pure Welsh stock, on 
the mother's side in the maternal line of pure 
Holland Dutch stock, and in the paternal line 
of Irish, English, and Scotch blood, with a pre- 
dominance of Irish. At the time of the son's 
birth the father was a pastor of the Baptist 
Church at Glens Falls, though he had formerly 
been a teacher. The mother had also enjoyed 

• Reprinted from The Independent, December 26, 1907. 



viii Charles Evans Hu^rhes 



&' 



a superior education and had an unusual apti- 
tude for mathematics, which was transmitted to 
her son. During his early years the boy stud- 
ied at home under his parents, and at the age 
of fourteen he entered Madison — now Coltrate 
— University. After two years he migrated to 
Brown University, from which he graduated in 
1881. His high standing was attested by his 
election to the Phi Beta Kappa Society ; he 
received honors in the classics and in English 
literature; and scholar as he was, he was also 
known among the students as a good fellow, 
who not only enjoyed social intercourse but 
participated in the amusements, pranks, and 
innocent follies of youth. 

Graduating at nineteen years of age, he 
taught school for a year to earn the means 
necessary to begin the systematic study of law, 
which meanwhile he read out of school hours 
in the office of a friendly lawyer. Then he 
entered the Columbia Law School, from which 
he graduated in 1884 with the highest honors. 
For the next three years he was clerk in a law 
office in New York City, while in the evenings 
he gave some instructions to law students. In 
1888 he became a member of the firm of 
Carter, Hughes, & Cravath, from which he 
withdrew in 1891, to accept a professorship of 



Introductory ix 

law in Cornell University, where his extraor- 
dinary abilities and attainments as a scholar, 
teacher, and lawyer were immediately recog- 
nized. At the earnest solicitation of Mr. Carter 
he joined him again in 1893, in the practice of 
law. And until his election as Governor he 
was continuously engaged in the active practice 
of his profession. 

I may here record some of the impressions 
made by Mr. Hughes on those who knew him 
at Cornell University and have since known 
him as a lawyer in New York City. In his 
physical build he was about six feet in height, 
slender rather than stout, but sturdy, tough, 
and wiry. Then, as now and always, he was 
a most indefatigable worker ; in this respect 
indeed he excels any man I have ever known. 
His mental outfit is not less remarkable. To 
understand things is a necessity of his nature. 
Like Lord Bacon he must have the " dry 
licrht " of reason on whatever he deals with — 
the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the 
truth, unaffected by any distorting or discolor- 
ing rays of passion, prejudice, or emotion. He 
possesses a powerful intellect, which is at once 
acute in action and comprehensive in range. 
Analysis is the mark of the great lawyer, and 
Mr. Hua;hes has this faculty in its highest 



Charles Evans Hu^ij-hcs 



t)' 



potency. Not less admirable is his ability to 
grasp quickly a complicated mass of facts and 
arran^re them in lo^-ical order. I have seen 
him work himself into new questions, feel his 
way to the heart of them, then gradually 
marshal the facts with reference to some fun- 
damental principle or some significant cir- 
cumstance until the whole situation became 
luminous even to the mind of a layman ; and 
all this time the speaker talked literally " like 
a book," and what he said might have been 
printed almost without change in a treatise on 
law or a commentary on cases. But this gift 
of intellectual divination and synthesis marks 
the creative mind. I\Ir. Hughes is not only 
analytic and critical but creative and con- 
structive. His friends, his associates at the 
bar, and the judges of the courts have long 
admired this remarkable combination of gifts. 
And the general public have become aware of 
them also since Mr. Hughes followed up his 
wonderful eas and insurance investiorations with 
drafting remedial legislation, and especially 
since as Governor he framed his Public 
Utilities Bill as a solution of the gravest 
question of public policy now before our 
people. 

Quite as remarkable as his intellectual gifts 



Introductory xi 

is his sense of justice and fair play. This was 
impressively recognized the other day by Mr. 
Ahearn when, at the close of his examination, 
he said that, whatever the finding of the Gov- 
ernor, he desired to thank him for the courtesy 
and fairness of the examination. Similarly, 
Mr. Hughes's fearlessness and independence 
have for many years been well understood by 
those who know him. And his firm attitude 
toward hostile politicians and legislators since 
he became Governor has given open proof of 
these characteristics to the public. Indeed, 
the moral attributes of the man are quite on a 
par with his intellect, powerful and capacious 
as that is, even if they do not surpass it. For 
Mr. Hughes has always been distinguished by 
absolute integrity of character and fidelity to 
duty. It is no accident, but the deepest in- 
stinct and conviction of his nature, that has 
made him the exponent and champion of the 
sacredness of fiduciary obligations alike in busi- 
ness and in politics. His own personal life is 
built on that foundation and his own profes- 
sional practice as a lawyer has been regu- 
lated by that principle. It meant fidelity to 
all his clients, but subserviency to none. He 
never accepted general retainers involving 
his commitment to any and every kind of 



xii Charles Evans Hughes 

service. Both his integrity and his sense of 
independence forbade truckhng to any chent 
and condoning dubious or crooked ways. 

I have said that Mr. Hucjhes is a marvellous 
worker ; he also becomes absorbed in his work 
so that for the time being nothing outside the 
range of his duties can greatly interest, much 
less excite him. It is not merely power of 
voluntary concentration, but involuntary ab- 
sorption in the object of his activity. His 
work literally takes possession of him and has 
at command the best that is in him. It is con- 
sequently impossible for him to do anything 
he undertakes in a half-hearted or slipshod 
manner. Whether teaching law, defending a 
client, or administering the affairs of the State 
of New York, he gives himself to the duty in 
hand with such whole-souled earnestness and 
devotion that no energy or interest is left for 
outside matters which do not concern him. 
And this circumstance, alontr with a laree 
natural endowment of common sense and ex- 
cellent practical judgment will explain why his 
course as a public servant has been so sure- 
footed and unerring. Few men have entered 
on public office surrounded by so many dan- 
gerous pitfalls; I recall no man who has made 
fewer mistakes. In view of it all one mieht 



Introductory xiii 

say that he is not only safe and sane, but 
almost infallibly sagacious. 

He has clearly defined to himself the scope 
and functions of his office as determined by 
the Constitution and the laws. So much the 
intellect of the man imperiously demanded. 
Then, having made clear to himself what ought 
to be done, he has dedicated all his powers to 
the service of the State ; at the same time he 
has rigidly and inexorably drawn the lines 
which separate the office of Governor from 
the functions of the Legislature on the one 
hand and of the Judiciary on the other. And 
being Governor, he has felt it incompatible 
with the dignity of the office or the duty he 
owes to all the people of the State to give any 
attention whatever to party politics or to party 
organization and manac^ement. While he was 
nominated by a party, he holds himself since 
his election the servant of the people and of 
the people alone. 

Mr. Hughes is under no illusions concern- 
ino- his nomination and election to the Gover- 
norship. He knows that the party leaders in 
general were opposed to him. They accepted 
him only because it was finally recognized 
that no other Republican nominee could win 
victory at the polls. My own personal belief 



xiv Charles Evans Hughes 

is that no one contributed more effectively to 
the enforcement of that view than President 
Roosevelt. As a most sagacious party leader, 
the President recognized in the hero of the 
gas and insurance investigations a name to 
wrest victory in a critical contest in his own 
State. I believe that in the interest of the 
party he urged the nomination, and that this 
pressure was the deciding influence in the con- 
vention. But all the while Mr. Hugrhes stood 
aloof as though the matter were no concern of 
his. And indeed he regarded it as no concern 
of his. He would not say he desired the 
office ; he would not authorize any one present 
to present his claims or herald his availability. 
It was a matter solely for the people of the 
State to decide. 

In the Latin lanoruaofe ambition meant a 
candidate's going about to solicit office. Of 
such a quality Mr. Hughes is absolutely devoid. 
It is one thino- to fill an office and another thinof 
to get an office. To get an office has never 
been Mr. Hughes's aim or desire. His oppor- 
tunities of public service have come to him 
unsought. It is not that he regards himself 
as superior to other men or that he does not 
value the good opinion of his fellow citizens. 
He does appreciate the confidence and es- 



Introductory xv 

teem of his fellows. But if they want him 
for public service he feels that the call should 
come from them ; and if they do not want 
him he does not desire the office ; so that in 
any event there is absolutely nothing for him 
to do. And he is so far from cherishing any 
illusions as to his comparative standing with 
other men that he recognizes very clearly that 
his nomination to public office was due to a 
combination of circumstances which made him, 
in the estimation of his party, the most avail- 
able man. He is the last man in the world to 
think himself a Moses, he knows he is not 
essential to the State, he does not pretend to 
be a leader with a mission, he claims only to 
be an every-day American citizen, who was 
selected for the Governorship (out of a number 
of others any one of whom might have been 
chosen) because of his prominence in the 
insurance investigation, which he had under- 
taken, not on his own initiative, but at the 
request of a legislative committee. As he 
would have nothing to do with getting the 
nomination, as the coming of the nomination 
to him was no concern of his, so there remained 
open to him only one way of showing his 
appreciation of the confidence which had been 
vouchsafed to him by the people of the State, 



xvi Charles Evans Hughes 

namely, by discharging the high duties to 
which they had called him with all the ability, 
wisdom, and virtue he could command. To 
thank any person or persons for the nomina- 
tion would have been tantamount to the con- 
fession that these persons had done him a 
favor. But from Mr. Hughes's way of look- 
ing at a nomination as a call of the people 
to serve them, with which he had no concern, it 
will be obvious that such a procedure would 
have been a stultifying of himself. On the 
other hand, inclination, duty, pride, and self- 
respect all conspire to move him to make a 
record as Chief Executive which shall amply 
justify the wisdom of the convention and the 
confidence of the people. 

" A disposition to preserve, and an ability 
to improve, taken together, would be my 
standard of a statesman," says Burke. 
Whether Mr. Hughes is in the habit of read- 
ing Burke I do not know. But his record 
since he became Governor admirably illustrates 
Burke's conception of a statesman. Recog- 
nizing that government is a marvellous con- 
trivance of human wisdom to provide for 
human wants, that it embodies the collective 
judgment, intellectual, moral, and practical, of 
many generations, including individuals wiser 



Introductory xvii 

and juster than any now alive, and that the 
government of the United States, in partic- 
ular, is the best and noblest system which the 
political genius of mankind has yet pro- 
duced, a statesman of the type described by 
Burke would look with suspicion on all sorts 
of projectors of innovation that threatened 
the Constitution and the well-established in- 
stitutions of the country. But he would also 
recognize with Burke that " a state without 
the means of some chang-e is without the 
means of its conservation." The principle of 
correction is as essential as the principle of 
conservation. But changes are not to be 
made at random, still less for the satisfaction 
of some abstract theory or dogma. Every 
change is to be made for the remedy of some 
definite evil, and it should be confined to the 
peccant part only and not extended to unof- 
fending members of healthy functions. And 
as it is circumstances which render every civil 
and political scheme beneficial or noxious to 
mankind, every proposal of reform should be 
considered on its own merits and especially 
with reference to its suitability and potency to 
remedy some particular evil in the existing 
system. 

Now look at Governor Hughes's utterances 



xviii Charles Evans Hu-j^hes 



is' 



and official acts. " Human Society," he de- 
clared at Chautauqua in August last, "cannot 
be stable unless it is progressive." The repub- 
lic, like every other living and growing organ- 
ism, must by successive changes adapt itself to 
its environment. But these affect, as it were, 
the outer parts of its organization. In itself 
considered, the republic, the Governor went 
on to say, " may be likened to a man of excel- 
lent constitution and native vitjor who finds 
there is no evidence of decay in his vital func- 
tions, and that there is every indication of 
fundamental soundness and of steady improve- 
ment." The analogy will be complete if we 
suppose this fundamentally sound man "de- 
termined by a proper system of hygiene and 
suitable rules of conduct to correct some dis- 
orders in his system and come as closely as 
possible to perfect health." And the first 
hygienic rule laid down by the Governor is 
"to avoid undue excitement of the nervous 
system." A most characteristic precept ! 

Happily we are not concerned with organic 
evils in the body politic. There are, indeed, 
functional disorders to be corrected. To 
diagnose them and to prescribe remedies is 
the business of reason and judgment. The 
first step is a knowledge of the facts. But this 



Introductory xix 

is not to be found in " scrappy sensationalism 
or distorted emphasis," still less in shrieking 
hysteria. It is a work of quiet, careful, and 
painstaking analysis and reflection. And till 
the truth regarding both the existing evil and 
the proposed remedy is accurately and ex- 
haustively known, no healthful or sensible 
action can be taken. Consequently, the reign 
of reason in government implies patience. 
And the need of patience "is the hardest 
lesson for a democracy to learn." Yet Gov- 
ernor Hughes has no vague fears about the 
outcome. He has a profound belief in the 
ability of the American people "to cure exist- 
ing evils without disturbing their prosperity." 
This is because the vital parts of our political 
organization are not impaired and retain effi- 
ciency to regenerate any defects. Thus con- 
servation and correction go hand in hand. 
And the way of salutary correction of reform is 
always by patience, by deliberation, by wisdom, 
by truth, by justice and fair play, as Governor 
Hughes never wearies of proclaiming. 

But we may submit the Governor's theories 
to the test of actual practice. How has he in 
his official acts managed to combine reform — 
not merely specious, but thoroughgoing and 
effective — of notorious abuses with a tender 



XX Charles Evans Hughes 

and reverent conservation of the Constitution 
and the existing institutions and machinery of 
government ? 

A test case is found in the Governor's pohcy 
of regulating the Public Service Corporations. 
It was for the State the problem which Presi- 
dent Roosevelt had stamped upon the con- 
sciousness of the nation, and solved in a way 
that will give him a permanent place in Ameri- 
can history. 

" By his vigorous administration," said Governor 
Hughes in his speech before the Republican Club of 
New York City, "his virility, his broad humanity, and 
his determined opposition to notorious abuses, our fellow- 
citizen, the distinguished President of the republic, has 
won the hearts of the people. We have not only his 
example, but we know that he is and has been in cordial 
sympathy with every effort for efficient administration 
for the correction of evil and for the improvement of 
our laws." 

But not only the interests concerned, the 
legislators of both parties were at first opposed 
to the Governor's measure of reform. The 
Governor, on the other hand, was deeply per- 
suaded that it was the duty of statesmanship 
"to remove the causes of unrest which lie in 
abuses of public privilege." A fundamental 
purpose of his measure of reform was to vindi- 
cate the adequacy of our institutions to put an 



Introductory xxi 

end to abuses without tumult or disorder, with- 
out injustice or demagoguery." The measure 
itself provided, to the fullest extent consistent 
with constitutional requirements, methods of 
investigation and redress through which the 
public obligations of reasonable, impartial, and 
adequate service could be enforced and public 
safety and convenience be conserved. In a 
speech delivered at Utica on April i the Gov- 
ernor explained his measure to the public, and 
four days later he defended it against criticism 
in a speech at Glens Falls. The proposed bill 
for the regulation of the public service corpo- 
rations was, I might perhaps not incorrectly 
say, based on the recognized principle that the 
tenure of their property was the performance of 
some duty. The Governor calmly, dispassion- 
ately, but with logical impressiveness, pointed 
out " that the people, without animosity to- 
ward the rights of property, but with a just 
insistence upon the performance of public 
obligations, demand that the State shall exer- 
cise its power over its creatures and compel 
due regard for the duties which are correlative 
to the privileges it has granted." Every power 
which a corporation has is derived from the 
Legislature, which creates it. A Public Service 
Commission is an administrative board, which 



xxii Charles Evans Husrhes 



£>' 



represents the Legislature in the supervision 
and control of these creatures of the laws, its 
function being to secure for the public safety 
impartiality, adequacy of service, and reason- 
able charges. Nor is the existence and exer- 
cise of this power inconsistent with property 
rights. For "the property of a public service 
corporation has been acquired subject to this 
power." And as no person can, under the 
Constitution, be deprived of his property with- 
out due process of law, the courts will protect 
the corporations against regulation which has 
the effect of confiscation. The Governor ob- 
jected to giving the courts power to review all 
orders of the Commission, first, because this 
would overwhelm the courts with business of a 
purely administrative character, and secondly, 
because it would in effect make the legislative 
Commissions purely advisory bodies and the 
courts themselves the fmal rulinof administra- 
tive authority. There were other explanations 
equally broad and convincing, but I have 
space to quote only one paragraph from the 
speeches, which is, however, an example of 
the Governor's manner of statement, arou- 
ment, and logical appeal : 

" Those who desire to insure the stability of honorable 
business enterprise ; those who desire to maintain an or- 



Introductory xxiii 

derly society, secure against the success of insincere and 
inflammatory appeal ; those who desire to maintain our 
institutions, with their guaranties of equality before the 
law and with their blessings of opportunity, realize that 
the time has come when the State must assert its power 
firmly and justly in putting an end to existing abuses, 
both in the administration of government and in the 
management of those concerns which derive their vitality 
from public franchises. Those who oppose this just 
sentiment chant their own requiem." 

With those speeches the Governor left the 
fate of his bill to the people and their repre- 
sentatives in the Legislature. There was no 
longer doubt of the result. And to-day the 
people of the State of New York have a model 
law providing for the just and effective regula- 
tion of their public service corporations. 

The Governor's bill for the regulation of 
our public service corporations is, so far as I 
know, the most thorouorhoroino- and radical 
measure of the kind that has ever been enacted 
by any Legislature in America. Its justifica- 
tion is that it rests on sound principles of law, 
on justice and expediency. It is a real remedy 
for real evils, and in its operation it cannot but 
promote public tranquillity and enhance respect 
for law, order, and just government. I have 
already spoken of its affiliation to President 
Roosevelt's measures for the reofulation of 



xxiv Charles Evans Hughes 

interstate raihvays. It is interesting to ob- 
serve that Governor Hug-hes's bill g^ives the 
State Commissions power to control the issue 
of stocks and bonds by public service corpora- 
tions, power which, as the Governor explains, is 
necessary not merely to protect the investor, 
but to prevent the crippling of the public ser- 
vice or the demand for extortionate charges. It 
is a similar power which President Roose- 
velt desires to confer upon the Interstate 
Commerce Commission. In the fundamental 
policies of their administrations — the public 
regulation of railways — President Roosevelt 
and Governor Hughes are of identically the 
same mind. 

But while Governor Hucrhes can be a 
thoroughgoing radical in correcting serious 
evils in the administration of government, 
nothing could be more foreign to his nature 
than the arts of the demasroeue or the acts of 
passion, folly, and injustice in which those arts 
are so constantly exhibited. Governor Hughes 
is a man who would follow his own sense of 
truth and justice even at the peril of popular 
displeasure. The guardian of the interests of 
the people, he has courage and magnanimity 
enough to protect those interests by measures 
which, through the influence of misrepresenta- 



Introductory xxv 

tion or the first impulse of uninformed judg- 
ment, the people themselves might hesitate to 
endorse or actually condemn. But, as Alex- 
ander Hamilton said in defining in The Feder- 
alist the qualifications which are necessary in 
a national chief executive : 

" The republican principle demands that the deliberate 
sense of the community should govern the conduct of 
those to whom they intrust the management of their 
affairs ; but it does not require an unqualified com- 
plaisance to every sudden breeze of passion, or to every 
transient impulse which the people may receive from the 
arts of men who flatter their prejudices to betray their 
interests." 

Governor Hughes's courage was strikingly 
evinced in his veto of the two-cent railroad 
fare bill. Other States had passed such meas- 
ures. In this State there was dissatisfaction 
with existing conditions. A wave of resent- 
ment against the railways was sweeping over 
the country. The two-cent passenger act had 
come to be regarded as a test of loyalty to 
the cause of the people, and no Governor any- 
where, whatever his views, had been strong 
enough to resist the overwhelming pressure. 
Under these circumstances Governor Hughes 
sat down and wrote an able and dispassion- 
ate message in which, on grounds of justice, 



XX vi Charles Evans Hughes 

public policy, and practical expediency, he 
vetoed the bill. Here are some of the grounds 
on which he based his action : 

True to his character, the Governor first 
made the point that facts had not been ascer- 
tained before the passage of the bill. There 
had been no official investigations, no reports, 
no collecting of statistics. The Legislature 
had acted without information and without 
suitable deliberation. It is of the utmost im- 
portance indeed that " the management of our 
railroad corporations should be subject to 
strict supervision by the State, and that regu- 
lations compelling the observance of the law 
and proper and adequate service should be 
rigidly enforced." Nevertheless, the Governor 
was convinced that the bill under considera- 
tion represented "a policy seriously mistaken 
and pregnant with disaster." The railroads 
have indeed been guilty of treating the public 
unfairly, 

"but injustice on the part of the railroad corporations 
toward the public does not justify injustice on the part of 
the State toward the railroad corporations. The action 
of government should be fair and impartial, and upon 
this every citizen, whatever his interest, is entitled to 
insist. We shall make matters not better, but worse, 
if to cure one wrong we establish another. ... In 



Introductory xxvii 

dealing with these questions democracy must demonstrate 
its capacity to act upon deliberation and to deal justly," 

The Governor recognized that a maximum 
two-cent passenger rate might not be unrea- 
sonably low. It might be high enough in 
many cases — possibly in all. The fact was, 
however, that no one knew, and that the Legis- 
lature, before acting, had not secured the 
necessary information. And to enact legisla- 
tion involving property rights in ignorance 
both of the conditions of the business con- 
cerned and of the effect upon It of the policy 
proposed was something that the just, deliber- 
ate, and law-abiding mind of the Governor 
could not by any possibility have approved. 

" I deem it most important," the Governor went on to 
say, " that the policy of dealing with matters of this sort 
arbitrarily, by legislative rule of general application, 
without reference to the demands of justice in particular 
cases, should be condemned. Every workingman, every 
tradesman, and every citizen believing himself to have 
aught at stake in the prosperity of the country, should 
determinedly oppose it. For it not only threatens the 
stability of business enterprise, which makes our pros- 
perity possible, but it substitutes unreason for sound 
judgment, the ill-considered demands of resentment for 
the spirit of fair play, and makes impossible patient and 
honorable effort to correct abuses." 

The constructive mind of the Governor 



xxviii Charles Evans Hu«fhes 



t>' 



could not, however, rest satisfied with the 
mere negative result which his veto would 
produce. The evils it was proposed to remedy 
by this hasty and ill-digested legislation could, 
he pointed out, be remedied in "a better way." 
The Legislature had provided agencies for the 
redress of these evils in the Public Service 
Commissions it had just created. These Com- 
missions had under law the power, and it 
would become their duty, to investigate the 
subject of passenger rates charged by railways 
in the State of New York. What the Legisla- 
ture had attempted with haste, without in- 
formation, and possibly with injustice, they 
could undertake with deliberation, with full 
knowledge, and with perfect impartiality. 
When their inquiry is complete, " if a pas- 
senger rate of two cents a mile is just and 
reasonable, it can be fixed ; if it is not just and 
reasonable, it should not be fixed." True, the 
work of the Commissions would require time 
and investigation, but democracy must learn 
the lessons of patience and deliberate inquiry 
before action. A right result is of infinitely 
more importance than a sham remedy. For 
the rest, it is most danoferous to encouraee 
" impatience with the orderly processes of 
inquiry." 



Introductory xxix 

A courageous and honest public servant 
always meets with his reward. On second 
thought people approve of what he has done. 
This is notably the case when the man is sen- 
sible, open-minded, judicial, and statesmanlike, 
as Mr. Hughes has proved himself since he 
became Governor. And so even the advo- 
cates of the two-cent passenger bill not only 
recognized the force and justice of the Gover- 
nor's arguments against that particular meas- 
ure, but suddenly perceived also that the very 
thing they were contending for as a just and 
reasonable reform must, if it were actually 
found on investigation to be just and reason- 
able, come to them through the action of the 
State Commissions which Governor Hughes 
himself had induced the Les^islature to estab- 
lish for the handling of those very problems. 
The difference in procedure is an argument in 
favor of the Governor's method. For, unlike a 
Legislature, a State Commission can regulate 
a public service corporation intelligently, delib- 
erately, and with scrupulous justice. And this 
is what the American people want. " They 
are," says Governor Hughes, " a thoughtful 
and canny people, truth-loving, and desirous 
of getting at the heart of things ; appeals to 
reason are more cogent than many think." 



XXX Charles Evans Hughes 

That eminent lawyer, jurist, and leader of 
the American bar, the late James C. Carter, 
has left behind him a work on the Origin, 
Growth, and Ftmction of Law (which has 
just been published), in which he deprecates 
the exaggerated estimate entertained by most 
people of the possibilities for good which may 
be realized through the enactment of law. 
Such a wealth of legislation testifies, indeed, 
to the "benevolent vanity" of our rulers, but 
also to their impotence. There is, however, 
another and more serious aspect of the case. 
"Among the evils which oppress society" says 
Mr. Carter, "there are few greater than that 
caused by legislative expedients undertaken in 
ignorance of what the true nature and function 
of law are." The analytic habit of Mr. 
Hughes's mind, his mastery of the science of 
law, and his large experience as a practical 
lawyer would seem to have predisposed him 
to the same view. At any rate, it is a fact that 
as Governor the number of measures of new 
legislation which he has advocated is very 
small, though it goes without saying that every 
one of them was well considered and carefully 
drafted. This moderation in the use of legis- 
lation is a characteristic of all wise constructive 
reformers. 



Introductory xxxi 

In the universal demand for new legislation 
which Mr. Carter deprecates it is constantly 
overlooked that the Chief Executive, whether 
State or National, has, under the Constitution, 
nothing to do with legislation except to recom- 
mend measures to the Legislature and approve 
or veto the bills which the Legislature, in the 
plenitude of its wisdom and discretion, may 
enact. As Hamilton put it in The Federalist : 

"The essence of the legislative authority is to enact 
laws — or, in other words, to prescribe rules — for the 
regulation of the society; while the execution of the 
laws and the employment of the common strength, either 
for this purpose or for the common defence, seem to 
comprise all the functions of the executive magistrate." 

That the execution of the laws is the princi- 
pal business of the Governor of the State has 
been clearly apprehended by Mr. Hughes. 
He not only understands it, he has proclaimed 
it, and what is more important, he acts upon 
it. Nay, he goes further. He claims that a 
perfect administration of every office would 
dispel almost all the problems which now per- 
plex us. The irrepressible and multitudinous 
activities of our Legislatures are, in the main, 
but devices to atone for defects in administra- 
tion. Here is the Governor's own language, 
taken from his address at the opening of the 



xxxii Charles Evans Hughes 

Civic Forum, in Carnegie Hall, New York 
City, on the 20th of November : 

" Matthew Arnold tells us that conduct is three- 
fourths of life. Certainly the administration of office is 
at least three-fourths of political life. And if we could 
secure the administration of every office in accordance 
with its obligations and in adequate fulfilment of the 
fair intent of the Constitution and statutes creating it, 
we should find almost all our problems solved. That 
which is right in our system of government would ap- 
pear revealed in the beauty of perfect adaptation, leav- 
ing no excuse for the use of legislative drugs to cure 
defects caused by lack of administrative exercise; and, 
on the other hand, such imperfections as existed would 
stand out in such bold relief as to leave little room 
for doubt as to the necessary remedy." 

The crowning aim, the supreme effort, of 
Governor Hugrhes is to be a cfood admin- 
istrator of his office and executor of the laws 
of the State. The Governor is the chief serv- 
ant of the people ; he is not the delegate of a 
feudal suzerain who permits him to promote 
personal or directs him to promote party ends ; 
he is his own master, dedicated to a service 
which is perfect freedom, because it satisfies 
his own conscience, fulfils the law, and ad- 
vances the welfare of the people. Disinter- 
ested, devoted, and strenuous service has been 
rendered by Governor Hughes. Like another 



Introductory xxxiii 

Governor — I mean Mr. Roosevelt — he has 
faced the bosses and beaten them ; like Mr. 
Roosevelt, he has made fitness and merit the 
qualifications for office ; and, like Mr. Roose- 
velt, he has been a terror to evil-doers in 
office. 

The greater part of administration is local. 
But the Constitution provides for removal by 
the Governor, upon charges and after a hear- 
ing, of specified local officers elected by the 
people. Few of us have any adequate con- 
ception of the amount of work even one of 
these cases makes for a conscientious and 
painstaking Governor. In the case of Mr. 
Ahearn, Governor Hughes spent weeks in go- 
ing over testimony, listening to cross-examina- 
tion of witnesses, studying briefs, and weighing 
evidence — working from early in the morning 
till late at night — though he might have turned 
the whole matter over to a commissioner, as 
would have been necessary had not the Gov- 
ernor also been an excellent lawyer. Why 
did the Governor undertake these herculean 
labors? The answer is obvious : In the inter- 
est of good administration in every office in 
the State. Mr. Hughes is the trustee of the 
people of the State of New York for the main- 
tenance of eood administration in his own 



xxxiv Charles Evans Hughes 

office and under certain circumstances in 
other offices in which the Constitution gives 
him jurisdiction. And as he said before the 
Civic Forum, " The lesson of to-day, both in 
business and in politics, is the lesson of fidelity 
to trust." As his insurance investigations 
were a moral tonic to the business world, so 
these investiijations into the administration of 
public office cannot fail to elevate the stand- 
ards and quicken the sense of responsibility 
of all office-holders in the State. It is for- 
tunate that the Governor, with his usual can- 
dor and justice, is able to compliment the 
service with the declaration that it would be 
difficult to point to a time "when a larger 
proportion of public officers were striving hon- 
estly to do their duty." This is the reward of 
the people for putting in the highest office in 
the State a man who preaches, practises, and 
demands honest, disinterested, efficient, and 
energetic service for the benefit of the people 
of the State. 

The Governor summed up his own position 
in a couple of pregnant sentences in his ad- 
dress before the Republican Club in New 
York City on the i8th of October : 

"With reference to matters of administration, it has 
been sought to conduct the ])ublic affairs solely in the 



Introductory xxxv 

interest of the people, and not in behalf of any special 
interest or for selfish purposes, and not for partisan ad- 
vantage save as fidelity and efficiency may have their 
due reward in public confidence. ... If there is one 
thing more than another for which I desire the present 
administration to stand, it is for disinterestedness in 
public service." 

It was in this same speech that the Gov- 
ernor indulged in a personal vein of talk on 
other matters. " I do not seek any public 
office," he said, and then added these memora- 
ble words : 

" To me public office means a burden of responsibility 
— a burden of incessant toil at times almost intolerable — 
which, under honorable conditions and at the command 
of the people, it may be a duty and even a pleasure to 
assume, but it is far from being an object of ambition. 
I have not sought nor shall I seek, directly or indirectly, 
to influence the selection or the vote of any delegate to 
any convention." 

Here are one or two more intimate con- 
fessions : 

" I want simply to be Governor during my term. 

" I have asked no man for favors, but, on the contrary, 
I have constantly insisted that the work of the govern- 
ment shall be carried on, not with reference to the selfish 
advantage of any one, but exclusively in the interest of 
the people." 

Facing an audience of Republican Club 



xxxvi Charles Evans Hughes 

politicians he frankly stated and squarely an- 
swered the charore that he had necjlected the 
party politicians in appointments to office. It 
had been hinted in a half-serious way that he 
regarded political activity as a disqualification 
for public office. Here is the Governor's 
irrefragable reply : 

" I esteem those who in an honorable manner work for 
the party. Political activity, by virtue of the experience 
and knowledge of affairs gained in it, so far from being 
a disqualification, may be a most important qualification 
for office. But I want that political activity to be of 
such a character as to leave a man free and independent 
in the dignity of his manhood to perform the duties of 
office, if appointed, unembarrassed by improper influ- 
ences and unaffected by accumulated obligations." 

Again, he tells these politicians that he does 
"not aim to be a party boss." Nay, such is 
his conception of the duties of the governor- 
ship that he would not think it proper to 
indulge even in political management. And, 
to crown all, he declares that " as a party 
man he will serve his party best in office 
by adhering strictly to his duties and main- 
taining the highest standards of impartial 
administration." 

And yet this efficient servant of the State 
and trusted popular leader never forgets to 



Introductory xxxvii 

pay his tribute to the party to which he 
belongs : 

" The Republican party has been a party of ideals, of 
masterful leaders, and of constructive power. We are 
proud that we are members of it," 

It has been said that Governor Hughes, if 
not too self-reHant, is too chary of receiving 
advice. But it must be remembered that when 
he was elected Governor on the RepubHcan 
ticket all the other State officials elected were 
Democrats. Furthermore, the leaders of his 
own party were in the main either indifferent 
or hostile to him. Thus he found himself in 
a new, difficult, and vastly responsible position 
without natural advisers, and he was compelled 
" to play a lone hand." The manner he had 
to assume for self-protection gave rise to the 
silly report that he was cold and unsympa- 
thetic. His friends know what a caricature 
this is of a naturally friendly, kind-hearted, 
and affable gentleman. Even the critics are 
now discovering their mistake. And the Gov- 
ernor is gradually discovering whom he can 
trust. Gradually, too, the old leaders have 
come to him, and he has listened patiently 
to their recommendations, though reserving to 
his own judgment and conscience the right 



xxxviii Charles Evans Hughes 

and duty of final decisions. Of course, his sit- 
uation is different from that of a President of 
the United States, who has a Cabinet to advise 
him on all matters, and Senators to make 
recommendations on appointments that have 
no force without their consent and approval. 
Nevertheless, Governor Hughes has made ex- 
cellent appointments, and as a Governor who 
has been at once a public servant and a public 
leader he has made amazingly few mistakes. 
Indeed, I do not hesitate to affirm that, though 
our State has had illustrious names in the 
list of its Governors, including the names 
of Grover Cleveland and Theodore Roosevelt, 
it has never had a greater Governor than 
Charles Evans Hughes. 

Ithaca, N. Y. 



Public Office and Party 
Principles 



" We make our appeal to the common-sense of the Ameri- 
can people which has never failed to express itself decisively 
in a great crisis. We are pledged to just reforms in the 
American ffianner, in accordance with the genius of our 
institutions, and with love of truth and even-handed jus- 
tice." — From Governor Hughes's speech accepting his 
nomination for Governor, October 3, 1906. 



I. 

Reply to Committee Appointed to Notify 
him of his Nomination for Mayor 
of New York City, October g, 1905. 

Mr. Chairman and Gentlemeji of the Notifica- 
tion Coinmittee : 

You summon me to what you believe to be 
a public duty, and I shall not answer that 
summons by referring to considerations merely 
personal, however important they might be if 
the question were one of personal preference. 

You and the many others who have urged 
me to accept the nomination have not rested 
the request upon the basis of partisan obliga- 
tion, but upon the more secure foundation of 
duty to the community. It has been impressed 
upon me that the Republican party is seeking 
to raise a standard to which, regardless of 
party, all men may resort who desire to see 
our city free from the pervasive influence of 
an organization whose motive is gain and not 

service. 

3 



Charles Evans Hu^^hcs 



£>' 



I am not insensible to this appeal, and I 
fully appreciate the responsibility of the posi- 
tion in which, against my will, I have been 
placed. The letters which I have received 
and the personal appeals which have been 
made have shown very clearly that there is a 
division of sentiment as to the course I shall 
pursue, and that either action I might 
take would be viewed with extreme dis- 
favor by men whose judgment I respect 
and of whose sincerity there can be no 
question. 

In this dilemma I have simply to do my 
duty as I see it. In my judgment I have no 
right to accept the nomination. A paramount 
public duty forbids it. It is not necessary to 
enlarge upon the importance of the insurance 
investigation. That is undisputed. It is deal- 
ing with questions vital to the interests of 
millions of our fellow citizens throucrhout the 
land. It presents an opportunity for public 
service second to none, and involves a cor- 
relative responsibility. I have devoted myself 
unreservedly to this work. It commands all 
my energies. It is imperative that I continue 
in it. You have frankly recognized that it 
must continue unembarrassed and with un- 
impaired efficiency. But it is entirely clear 



Nomination for Mayor, 1905 5 

to me that this cannot be if I accept the 
nomination. 

You know how desirous I have been that 
the investigation should not be colored by any 
suggestion of political motive. Whatever con- 
fidence it has inspired has been due to absolute 
independence of political considerations. It is 
not sufficient to say that an acceptance of this 
nomination, coming to me unsought and despite 
an unequivocal statement of my position, would 
not deflect my course by a hairbreadth, and 
that I should remain, and that you intend that 
I should remain, entirely untrammelled. The 
non-political character of the investigation and 
its freedom from bias, either of fear or favor, 
not only must exist, but must be recognized. 
I cannot permit them by any action of mine to 
become matters of debate. 

There are abundant opportunities for mis- 
construction. Doubtless many abuses will re- 
main undisclosed, many grievous wrongs to 
which the evidence points from time to time 
may be found unsusceptible of proof; many 
promising clues will be taken up in vain. 
Were I with the best of intentions to accept 
the nomination, it is my conviction that the 
work of the investigation would be largely 
discredited ; its motives would be impugned 



6 Charles Evans Hughes 

and its integrity assailed. To many it would 
appear that its course would be shaped and 
its lines of inquiry would be chosen, developed, 
or abandoned as political ambition might 
prompt or political exigency demand. 

Such a situation would be intolerable. There 
is only one course open. The legislative 
inquiry must proceed with convincing disin- 
terestedness. Its great opportunities must not 
be imperilled by alienating the support to 
which it is entitled or by giving the slight- 
est occasion for questioning the sincer- 
ity and single-mindedness with which it is 
conducted. 

There is, however, another consideration 
which is to me conclusive. The work of the 
investigation is laborious and exacting. It 
taxes the strength of the counsel of the com- 
mittee to its limit. It is performed under 
ofreat strain. Whatever success is stained is 
the result of unremittinof toil and undivided 
attention. There is no wizardry in it. 

It is idle to suppose that, if I accepted your 
nomination, I could do my part of the work 
of the investigation efficiently. I may be 
pardoned for saying that I am a better judge 
of what that work requires than any one 
apart from my associates. It requires every 



Nomination for Mayor, 1905 7 

moment of available time. It requires endeavor 
secure from interruption and a mind free from 
distraction. It has been suggested that it 
would not be necessary for me to make an 
active canvass, that I should not be obliged 
to make a speech, to attend a meeting, or even 
write a letter. In effect, you ask me to enter 
upon a campaign in which important questions 
should be discussed and brought home to the 
conscience of the people with my mouth closed 
and my hands tied. Apart from a natural dis- 
inclination to place myself in such a situation, 
I believe the plan to be wholly impracticable. 
But, assuming it to be carried out as fully as 
is contemplated, it would still leave a large 
demand upon time and nervous energy which 
would be inexorable and would introduce an 
element of distraction most injurious to the 
investigation. I do not believe that the man 
lives, and certainly I am not the man, who, 
while a candidate for the mayoralty, could 
perform with proper efficiency that part of the 
work which has been devolved upon me in the 
pending inquiry. If I were to accept the nomi- 
nation for the high office of Mayor of this 
city, I should be obliged to curtail this work, 
and this I have no right to do. 

For your expression of confidence I thank 



8 Charles Evans Hu<^hes 



&' 



you. The honor you would confer upon me I 
most highly esteem. Your generous approval 
and the unanimity and enthusiasm with which 
the nomination was made I warmly appreciate. 
But I have assumed obliorations of the first 

o 

importance which make it impossible for me 
to meet your wishes. I must therefore re- 
spectfully decline the nomination. 



II. 

speech in Response to Formal Notifica- 
tion of His Nomination as the Repub- 
Hcan Candidate for Governor, at the 
RepubHcan Club, New York City, 
October 3, 1906, 

Mr. Chairman and Gentlemen of the Notifica- 
tion Committee : 

Highly appreciating the honor you have 
conferred and reaHzing keenly the respon- 
sibility to be assumed, I accept the nomina- 
tion. As a life-long Republican, as one loyal 
to the principles and best traditions of the 
party, I respond to the unanimous call of the 
Convention. I especially claim to represent 
true Republicanism when I promise to ad- 
minister the affairs of the State in the interest 
of all its citizens. I recognize the exigency 
which has made us the trustees of the con- 
science and sober sentiment of the people of 
the State and has charged us with the duty of 
leadership in a contest for decent government. 

9 



lo Charles Evans Hugrhes 



fe' 



To this contest, humbly conscious of my own 
limitations but strong in the strength of the 
cause, I commit myself heart and soul without 
doubt as to the result. 

We enter upon the campaign inspired by 
the example and fortified by the achievements 
of our great leader, Theodore Roosevelt. The 
National Administration, with its record of 
established reforms, has strengthened its hold 
upon the confidence of the people. Govern- 
mental powers for investigation and prosecu- 
tion have been freely used to end the abuses 
and discriminations w^hich have afflicted inter- 
state commerce, to break up unlaw^ful com- 
binations, and to enforce the provisions of the 
Anti-Trust Act. The activities of Congress 
in the interest of all the people have been 
attested by the passage of the Railroad Rate 
Act, the Meat Inspection Act, the Pure Food 
Act, and the Employers' Liability Act. 

In referring to this record of the Federal 
Administration, I should not be understood to 
imply that this is a campaign of National 
issues. The paramount issues in this cam- 
paign are State issues. But in the matters 
which I have mentioned we find a notable 
record of achievement which presents a striking 
contrast to the noisy pretensions of the hour. 



Nomination for Governor, 1906 11 

Our State Administration has also accom- 
plished many genuine reforms. 

The gas and electric monopoly of New York 
City has been subjected to impartial investiga- 
tion, and a statute has been passed fixing the 
rate to private consumers at eighty cents per 
one thousand cubic feet. While this Act has 
been attacked and the claim of the companies 
that the rate is so low as to amount to con- 
fiscation is before the Federal Courts for de- 
termination, the State has done all that it can 
do constitutionally to give the residents of this 
city cheaper gas. 

Corporations have been prohibited from 
contributing to political campaign funds. 

The law as to perjury has been made more 
stringent. 

Corrupt lobbying has been made more diffi- 
cult, and the honorable presentation of argu- 
ment relating to legislative measures has been 
promoted by a statute compelling the registra- 
tion of persons and the filing of statements 
of compensation paid. 

Good roads have been provided for. 

An Act has been passed extending the lia- 
bility of railroads for personal injuries suffered 
by employees. 

The Liquor License Law has been amended 



12 Charles Evans Hus^hes 



£5' 



so as to abolish the iniquities which had grown 
up in connection with the so-called Raines 
Law hotels. 

The business of life insurance, of vital con- 
sequence to the security of our homes, has 
been purged of its abuses and placed under 
restrictions conserving the interests of policy- 
holders. 

Our great life insurance companies which 
were mutual in theory have been made so in 
fact and the policyholders have been given 
free opportunity to elect their representatives. 

And in connection with the proceedings 
which led to these legislative measures the 
attention of the country has been directed to 
correct standards of business morality and 
the conscience of the people has been aroused 
to a more insistent demand for the strict dis- 
charge of fiduciary obligation and for honesty 
in public and private life. 

It is proper that w^e should rejoice, and 
we do frankly rejoice, that while these reforms 
had the support of the sentiment of the State, 
they were accomplished under the Republican 
administration. And apart from his official 
relation to the lecrislation to which I have 
referred, it is with special pleasure that I 
refer to the cordial support of which I was 



Nomination for Governor, 1906 i^ 



o 



constantly made aware during the gas and 
insurance investigations on the part of Gov- 
ernor Frank W. Higgins. 

What do we find in opposition to us ? 

A masquerade. An Independence League, 
whose independence has been betrayed, and a 
so-called but spurious Democratic party which 
has violated every principle of Democratic 
government. 

No one can deny us the right to pay just 
tribute to " Jeffersonian Democrats" or to 
*' Lincoln Republicans." Our contest is not 
with them and the candidates opposed to us 
are not of them. Vain is it for our opponents 
to parade in the livery of virtue. Empty are 
their professions and hollow their declarations 
and promises. 

If you would know the sort of administra- 
tion we should have in the event of their suc- 
cess, look at the Buffalo Convention, for there 
you will find their methods mirrored — 
their motive, selfishness, and their method, 
intrigue. 

We test the sincerity of their assertion of 
independence by their efforts to procure the 
Democratic nomination. 

We test the sincerity of their denunciation 
of bosses by their deals with bosses. 



14 Charles Evans Hughes 

We test the sincerity of their appeals to 
American ideals by their despotic proceedings. 

We test the sincerity of their attacks upon 
the use of money in politics by their use of 
money in politics. 

We test the sincerity of their devotion to 
the interests of the people by their efforts 
to foment disorder and exploit ignorance in 
the interest of selfish ambition. 

What, then, is the supreme issue of this 
campaign ? It is not an issue of the Repub- 
lican record. It is not an issue of Republican 
principles or of Democratic principles. It is 
not a partisan issue at all. It is the vital issue 
of decent o-overnment. It is an issue which 
shall array on one side all lovers of truth, of 
sobriety, and of honest reform, be they Repub- 
licans, Democrats, or Independents. 

The question is whether the unholy alliance 
that succeeded at Buffalo shall capture the 
State of New York. 

Loyal, then, as we are to the Republican 
party, we stand to-night upon a broader plat- 
form, claiming as a right the support of all 
good citizens. For while we are Republicans, 
we are citizens first, and in this campaign we 
stand for the honor of the State. 

In my message to the Convention I stated 



Nomination for Governor, 1906 15 

that if elected it would be my ambition to give 
the State a "sane, efficient, and honorable 
administration free from taint of bossism or 
of servitude to any private interest." 

This is my position in a nut-shell. 

It will be an unbossed administration. I 
believe in party organization — in clean, effi- 
cient organization. I promise all members of 
the party fair treatment and just consideration. 
No individual, or group of individuals, and 
no private interest will be permitted to dictate 
my policy. I shall decide and act according 
to my conscience and as I believe the public 
interest requires. 

I promise an honest administration. 

It will not be necessary for anyone to pay 
one cent to defeat what is called "strike" 
legislation. There will be no excuse for the 
improper expenditure of money upon that 
ground. 

On the other hand, so far as in me lies every 
effort to obstruct just and impartial adminis- 
tration, or to procure legislation or depart- 
mental action for the benefit of any individual 
or corporation in opposition to the public wel- 
fare, or to prevent action or legislation which 
the people should have, will be exposed and 
frustrated. 



1 6 Charles Evans Hughes 

No interest, however prominent will receive 
any consideration except that to which upon 
the merits of the case it may be entitled, when 
viewed in the light of the supreme interest of 
the people. 

It will be my aim to make the administration 
of the government efficient and economical. I 
am not committed to specific measures. I prom- 
ise an examination, careful and impartial, of all 
matters within the scope of my authority and 
such action as my honest judgment shall approve. 

I am deeply interested in all efforts to 
better the condition of our workinor men. 
Every practical measure for the real benefit of 
labor will have my cordial support. It would 
be difficult to point to a more important field 
of legislation than that illustrated by the Acts 
relating to tenement-houses, to sweat-shops, to 
child labor, and to hours of labor. These are 
important contributions to the cause and their 
provisions should be effectively administered, 
I believe in the thorough enforcement of the 
Labor Laws, and shall favor such appropria- 
tions and such equipment as will admit of their 
proper execution. 

I shall spare no effort to make effective the 
reforms in the business of life insurance so 
essential to the interests of policyholders. 



Nomination for Governor, 1906 17 

I promise the enforcement of the law with 
equal severity and equal justice to all, rich 
and poor, corporations and individuals. 

We are all members of one body politic. 
We could not separate our interests if we 
tried. We desire to preserve the opportuni- 
ties for individual initiative and the rewards 
of ability, industry, and integrity. We desire to 
protect the government, with its guaranties 
of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, 
from being used by any person or combination 
of persons to promote a selfish interest at the 
expense of the other members of the com- 
munity. We desire to enforce the laws we 
have and to enact such additional laws as may 
be required to secure equal privileges and 
opportunities and to prevent any one person 
or class of persons from being made the victim 
of oppression. We believe in open discussion 
and responsible criticism. But efforts to make 
discontent serve self-interest, to create class 
hatred, to distort the s^ood and to exagfSferate 
the evil, are subversive of free institutions 
and tend to anarchy. 

We make our appeal to the common sense 
of the American people, which has never failed 
to express itself decisively in a great crisis. 
We are pledged to achieve reforms in the 



1 8 Charles Evans Hughes 



is' 



American manner, in accordance with the 
genius of our institutions, and with love of 
truth and even-handed justice. 

It is in this spirit and with these pledges 
alone that I accept the nomination. 



III. 



Inaugural Address, Albany, N. Y., Janu- 
ary I, 1907. 

Fellow Citizens : — I assume the office of 
Governor without other ambition than to 
serve the people of the State. I have not 
coveted its powers nor do I permit myself to 
shrink from its responsibilities. Sensible of 
its magnitude and of my own limitations, I 
undertake the task of administration without 
illusion. But you do not require the impos- 
sible. You have bound me to earnest and 
honest endeavor in the interest of all the 
people according to the best of my ability 
and that obligation, with the help of God, 
I shall discharge. 

We have reason to congratulate ourselves 

that, coincident with our prosperity, there is 

an emphatic assertion of popular rights and a 

keen resentment of public wrongs. There is 

no panacea in executive or legislative action 

for all the ills of society which spring from the 

19 



20 Charles Evans Hughes 

frailties and defects of the human nature of 
its members. But this furnishes no excuse for 
complaisant inactivity and no reason for the 
toleration of wrongs made possible by defective 
or inadequate legislation or by administrative 
partiality or inefficiency. 

It is sometimes said that we have laws 
enough, and that the need is not of more law 
but of better enforcement of the law. There 
is abundant occasion for caution against hasty 
legislation. Whether or not we have laws 
enough, we certainly have enough of ill-con- 
sidered legislation, and the question is not as 
to the quantity but as to the quality of our 
present and of our proposed enactments. 

The proper confines of legislative action are 
not to be determined by generalities. Slowly 
but surely the people have narrowed the op- 
portunities for selfish aggression, and the 
demand of this hour, and of all hours, is not 
allegiance to phrases, but sympathy with every 
aspiration for the betterment of conditions 
and a sincere and patient effort to understand 
every need and to ascertain in the light of ex- 
perience the means best adapted to meet it. 
Each measure proposed must ultimately be 
tested by critical analysis of the particular 
problem, — the precise mischief alleged and the 



Inaugural Address, 1907 21 

adequacy of the proffered remedy. It is the 
capacity for such close examination without 
heat or disqualifying prejudice which distin- 
guishes the constructive effort from vain en- 
deavors to change human nature by changing 
the forms of government. 

It must freely be recognized that many of 
the evils of which we complain have their 
source in the law itself, in privileges carelessly 
granted, in opportunities for private aggran- 
dizement at the expense of the people reck- 
lessly created, in failure to safeguard our 
public interests by providing means for just 
regulation of those enterprises which depend 
upon the use of public franchises. Wherever 
the law gives unjust advantage, wherever it 
fails by suitable prohibition or regulation to 
protect the interests of the people, wherever 
the power derived from the State is turned 
against the State, there is not only room but 
urgent necessity for the assertion of the 
authority of the State to enforce the com- 
mon rieht. 

The growth of our population and the 
necessary increase in our charitable and cor- 
rectional work, the great enterprises under 
State control, — our canals, our highways, our 
forest preserves, — the protection of the public 



2 2 Charles Evans Huuhes 



t> 



health, the problems created by the congestion 
of population in our great cities, lead to a con- 
stant extension of governmental activity from 
which we cannot have, and we would not seek, 
escape. 

This extension compels the strictest insist- 
ence upon the highest administrative stand- 
ards. We are a government of laws and not 
of men. We subordinate individual caprice to 
defined duty. The essentials of our liberties 
are expressed in constitutional enactments re- 
moved from the risk of temporary agitation. 
But the security of our government, despite its 
constitutional guaranties, is found in the intel- 
ligence and public spirit of its citizens and in 
its ability to call to the work of administration 
men of single-minded devotion to the public 
interests, who make unselfish service to the 
State a point of knightly honor. 

If in administration we make the standard 
efficiency and not partisan advantage, if in ex- 
ecuting the laws we deal impartially, if in mak- 
ing the laws there is fair and intelligent action 
with reference to each exigency, we shall dis- 
arm reckless and selfish agitators and take 
from the enemies of our peace their vantage 
irround of attack. 

It is my intention to employ my constitu- 



Inaugural Address, 1907 23 

tional powers to this end. I believe in the 
sincerity and good sense of the people. I be- 
lieve that they are intent on having govern- 
ment which recognizes no favored interests 
and which is not conducted in any part for 
selfish ends. They will not be, and they 
should not be, content with less. 

Relying upon your support and hoping to 
deserve your continued confidence, with the 
single desire to safeguard your interests and 
to secure the honorable administration of the 
office to which you have called me, I now enter 
upon the discharge of its duties. 



IV. 

Speech at the Dinner of the Republican 
Club of the City of New York, October 
i8, 1907. 

Nearly twenty years ago I joined this club. 
It was the first political organization with which 
I became identified. Many of you have been 
my personal friends. It was in this building 
that I accepted the nomination for Governor 
and stated the issues which were regarded 
as paramount in the last campaign. It was 
under your auspices that, after the election, on 
an occasion which for the warmth of its greet- 
ing and the cordiality of its good wishes will 
never be forgotten, I attempted to set forth 
the principles which should govern my admin- 
istration. Related as I am to this club by such 
intimate and sentimental associations, it is es- 
pecially gratifying to have this opportunity of 
meeting with you. And I may be pardoned 
if I speak in a somewhat personal vein. 

I shall not attempt to recount in any detailed 

24 



New York, October i8, 1907 25 

or comprehensive manner what was accom- 
pHshed at the last session of the Legislature. 
It was a long session, but one remarkable 
for the importance of the general legislation 
enacted, and it reflected great credit upon the 
Legislature. 

One of the fundamental purposes of the ad- 
ministration is to vindicate the adequacy of our 
institutions, to put an end to abuses without 
tumult or disorder, without injustice or dema- 
goguery, and in a patient, deliberate, but none 
the less vigorous manner to insist upon the 
recognition and enforcement of public rights 
by availing ourselves to the utmost of the ex- 
isting machinery of government and by making 
such new provision as the interests of the 
people may require. A difficult problem of first 
importance was presented in connection with 
our public service corporations. It was our 
object to remove this from the field of reckless 
agitation and to provide, to the fullest extent 
consistent with constitutional requirements, 
methods of investigation and redress through 
which the public obligations of reasonable, im- 
partial, and adequate service could be enforced, 
and public safety and convenience be con- 
served. Our Public Service Commissions Law 
provides the necessary machinery and powers, 



26 Charles Evans Hughes 

to the use of which have been called men owing 
no allegiance to any special interest, unembar- 
rassed by either financial or political obliga- 
tion, who are devoting themselves with a single 
purpose to the protection of the rights of the 
people. Means have been provided to prevent 
the repetition of the wrongs which have been 
committed in the past, and through the use of 
the powers governing the issue of bonds and 
stocks, through insistence upon proper methods 
of bookkeeping, through the prescribed super- 
vision of the transactions of these corporations, 
it is believed that necessary publicity will be 
secured, that the rights of investors will be 
safeguarded, and that the public will be pro- 
tected from the reckless exploits of the un- 
scrupulous who hitherto have had their way 
without effective restraint. 

I believe most thoroughly in the efficient 
regulation of these public service corporations 
in the interest of the public. I believe that 
their transactions should be conducted in the 
light of day and under the public eye, that 
they should be compelled to furnish the service 
which they are bound by their charters to ren- 
der, and that all their public obligations should 
rigorously be enforced. 

I also believe in the reign of justice and in 



New York, October i8, 1907 27 

the patient consideration of every question to 
the end that it may be settled in a spirit of 
fairness. I have no more confidence in venee- 
ful methods and arbitrary legislation — in those 
political grafters who endeavor to make selfish 
profit out of public wrongs — than I have in 
the sycophants of corporate power. Nothing 
is permanent but truth and justice. And to 
attain it, in view of our human imperfec- 
tions and inherent limitations, we must address 
ourselves unceasingly to this end, content only 
with the award of our best judgment after 
a thorough understanding of the matter with 
which we attempt to deal. Accordingly I ad- 
vocated a measure containing a full grant 
of power to secure the right determination of 
each matter and to compel obedience to the 
requirements of the law. And at the same 
time I opposed arbitrary measures framed 
without consideration and reckless of conse- 
quences. 

It is also important that those who obtain 
privileges from the State should make due 
return to the State. In connection with our 
water powers a precedent has been established 
and consideration is now being: o^iven to the 
whole question of the development of the 
water powers of the State, so that what 



28 Charles Evans Huehes 



& 



belongs to the people may be wisely used for 
their benefit upon just terms. 

The leo^islation of the last session had re- 
gard not only to metropolitan problems, to 
evils afflicting commerce, but also to the needs 
of our great rural communities. The highway 
lecrislation enacted in accordance with the 
recommendations of the State Grange, and 
the consideration by the legislative committee 
now sitting of questions affecting the main- 
tenance and construction of roads, promise to 
put these important matters upon a better basis 
than ever before. The Labor Department 
has been strengthened, and legislation in rela- 
tion to hours of labor, child labor, and condi- 
tions of labor has been enacted. Our Corrupt 
Practices Act has been improved, and we are 
lookinof forward to needed chancres in our 
methods of nomination and election. 

I cannot dwell upon these matters at this 
time, but I wish to express my appreciation of 
the labor and the support, in and out of the 
Legislature, which have had their result in 
the important enactments to some of which 
I have briefly referred. 

Now, with reference to matters of adminis- 
tration, it has been sought to conduct the 
public affairs solely in the interest of the 



New York, October i8, 1907 29 

people and not in behalf of any special interest 
or for selfish purposes, and not for partisan 
advantage save as fidelity and efficiency may 
have their due reward in public confidence. 
This may seem a counsel of perfection, and of 
course human nature is not changed by official 
relations. But the welfare of the State de- 
pends upon the maintenance of this standard, 
and if there is one thing more than another 
for which I desire the present administration 
to stand, it is for disinterestedness in public 
service. 

To avoid any possibility of misapprehension 
regarding my own course, I may say this fur- 
ther word : I do not seek any public office. 
The majority of people doubtless think that 
the distinction and power of office are an 
irresistible attraction. If you had been con- 
stantly in my company during the past nine 
months you would see that another point of 
view is quite possible. To me public office 
means a burden of responsibility — a burden of 
incessant toil at times almost intolerable — 
which under honorable conditions and at the 
command of the people it may be a duty and 
even a pleasure to assume, but is far from be- 
ing an object of ambition. I have not sought, 
nor shall I seek, directly or indirectly, to 



3© Charles Evans Hughes 

influence the selection or the vote of any dele- 
gate to any convention, and with reference 
to the action of any delegate to any conven- 
tion there will be no suggestion or thought of 
influence, protest, or reprisal in the Executive 
Chamber. 

Those whom I have appointed to office 
have been counselled to have sole regard to 
the efficiency of the work of their depart- 
ments. I have asked no man for favors, but 
on the contrary I have constantly insisted that 
the work of government shall be carried on 
not with reference to the selfish advantage of 
any one but exclusively in the interest of the 
people. 

It has been stated that I have not paid 
sufficient attention to those who are politically 
active and who bear the burden and heat of 
the day in political campaigns. It has been 
said that I regard political activity as a dis- 
qualification for public office. Now no cause 
can be advanced without hard work and it 
must be the object of zealous devotion. I 
esteem those who in an honorable manner work 
for the party. Political activity by virtue of 
the experience and knowledge of affairs gained 
in it, so far from being a disqualification, may 
be a most important qualification for office. 



New York, October i8, 1907 31 

But I want that political activity to be of 
such a character as to leave a man free and 
independent in the dignity of his manhood 
to perform the duties of ofifice, if appointed, 
unembarrassed by improper influences and un- 
affected by accumulated obligations. We want 
in office men adapted to the office, with the 
character and the capacity which will enable 
them to discharge its duties, and if they can 
call political experience to their aid so much 
the better, so long as in that experience they 
have maintained their Individuality and self- 
respect and have remained worthy of the pub- 
lic confidence. This is a question of character 
and not of environment ; a question of one's 
conception of and fidelity to duty. 

Talking in this personal vein I may say that 
I have steadfastly refrained from becoming 
associated in any manner with factional con- 
troversies. I have no connection with or in- 
terest in the ambitions or efforts of rivals for 
political preferment or political leadership in 
any locality or in the State at large. I desire 
to see party activities conducted honorably, 
the freest expression of popular choice, and to 
have party organization represent the untram- 
melled wish of the members of the party 
without any interference on the part of the 



32 Charles Evans Hughes 

Executive. To this end I have favored the 
adoption of a plan for direct nominations and 
, have favored a permissive bill so that the 
plan could have a fair trial in the com- 
munities where it has the support of public 
sentiment. 

It is of great importance in my judgment 
that the discharge of the duties of the gov- 
ernorship should not be embarrassed by at- 
tempts at political management. Such is the 
power of the office that it lends itself easily 
to efforts at political control, and such a use of 
the office is, I believe, fraught with danger to 
the interests of the people of the State. It 
is far better that the Governor should exercise 
his office in the interest of the people without 
being embarrassed by the exigency of main- 
taining control of party machinery. And as a 
party man he will serve his party best in office 
by adhering strictly to his duties and main- 
taining the highest standards of impartial ad- 
ministration. It may be well that he should 
become the exponent of the principles and 
policies in furtherance of which he may have 
been elected. But his strencjth for their ad- 
vancement in popular approval and in the 
adoption which should rest upon that approval 
will soon be lost if he permits himself to 



New York, October i8, 1907 S3 

take part in contests for office or for party 
representation. 

I am frequently asked to express approval 
or disapproval of party action or of particular 
candidacies. Should I do so, it would fairly 
be incumbent upon me to pronounce upon 
such action or candidacies in advance and thus 
to attempt to determine the course to be pur- 
sued. If this were done in one case, it would 
be inevitable that it should be done in many 
cases, with consequent responsibility. If such 
responsibility be assumed, it must be accom- 
panied by action — by such attention to mat- 
ters of management as would be commensurate 
with the responsibility and would justify its 
assumption. The result is certain. Experi- 
ence shows you cannot stop short of it. If 
such a course be taken, either the Governor — 
and he cannot separate himself from his office 
— will be in undisputed control of party manage- 
ment and become a party boss, or he will be 
involved in continual contests for the mainte- 
nance of his political influence and prestige. 

Now I do not aim to be a party boss. I 
want simply to be Governor during my term. 
The only alternative to the course that I have 
criticised is to divorce the governorship from 
political entanglements, to keep its influence 



34 Charles Evans Hughes 

free from controversies that do not concern the 
office. And my conception of the duties, the 
responsibilities, and the power for good of that 
ofhce forbids me from throwino- its weio^ht or 

o o 

attempting to exercise its power except for 
the purpose of performing its constitutional 
functions. 

I have also frequently commented upon the 
importance of constant practical recognition of 
the limits assigned under our system of gov- 
ernment to the exercise of legislative, judicial, 
and executive powers. I have no desire to 
usurp the function of the Legislature in any 
degree. It is my privilege and duty to recom- 
mend to the Legislature such matters as I 
deem expedient. And when a matter is 
deemed to be expedient it is my duty to urge 
it as vigorously as I may. It is also my duty 
to pass upon the bills that come before me, 
and, when I believe that a measure is contrary 
to the interests of the State, to express my 
disapproval in the constitutional manner. But 
it is not my province to attempt to curtail the 
privileges of the Legislature or to seek to 
control its action, except as it may be influ- 
enced by the expression of sound opinion 
and by recommendations supported by the 
people of the State. 



New York, October i8, 1907 35 

I desire to see our legislative halls filled 
with men of strength and independence, — 
men yielding to no influence and subject to 
no control but that of reason and conscience 
and an honest conception of public duty. 
Undoubtedly opposition sometimes takes the 
name of independence when it only expresses 
servility to interests which cannot be openly 
espoused. Of such counterfeit independence 
which attempts in the interest of special privi- 
lege to balk efforts at honest government, I 
do not speak. There are important measures 
to be considered by the next Legislature. I 
do not ask any blind or servile following. 
I ask simply for honest consideration in the 
light of reason and for that support which 
men of rectitude, faithful to their oaths as 
legislators, true to their duty as representatives 
of the people, can give with a clear conscience. 

Fellow Republicans : the future is bright 
with hope. By his vigorous administration, 
his virility, his broad humanity, and his de- 
termined opposition to notorious abuses, our 
fellow citizen, the distinguished President of 
the Republic, has won the hearts of the peo- 
ple. We have not only his example, but we 
know that he is and has been in cordial sym- 
pathy with every effort for efificient adminis- 



36 Charles Evans Hughes 

tratlon, for the correction of evil, and for the 
improvement of our laws. The Republican 
party has been a party of ideals, of masterful 
leaders, and of constructive power. We are 
proud that we are members of it. It is a 
national party, but its potency in national 
affairs inevitably depends in large degree upon 
its zealous pursuit in State affairs of those 
ideals of disinterested and capable administra- 
tion which are treasured by the people irre- 
spective of party. In this State our highest 
duty to the party is to bring to public service 
men who are resolute, efficient, and single- 
minded, and to insure the exercise of govern- 
mental powers in the interest of all the people. 
Discharging this duty, the party cannot fail to 
enlarge the area of its support, and the suc- 
cesses of the future will far transcend the 
distinction of its past accomplishments. 



V. 

Correspondence with James S. Lehmaier 
of New York City. 

The Republican Club of the City of New York 
54 and 56 West 40th Street 

New York, January 18, 1908. 

Hon. Charles E. Hughes, 
Albany, N. Y. 

My Dear Governor : 

At a recent meeting of the Republican Club of the 
City of New York, very largely attended, a resolution 
was adopted with practical unanimity strongly urging 
the next Republican National Convention to nominate 
you for the office of President of the United States, and 
to that end inviting the co-operation of Republicans 
generally. 

The president of the Club has appointed a Committee 
of twenty-five to carry out the purpose of the resolution. 

The Committee has entered upon the duties assigned 
to it and its efforts have met with a most gratifying 
public response. 

Under the circumstances, it has seemed to us that 
some expression from you would be timely. 

As Chairman of this Committee and in the hope that 

37 



38 Charles Evans Hughes 

this suggestion may meet with your approval, I write to 
inquire whether you will meet your fellow members of 
the Republican Club at its Club-house at such time as 
may suit your convenience. 

Very sincerely yours, 

James S. Lehmaier. 

State of New York 
Executive Chamber 

Albany, January 21, 1908. 

Mr. James S. Lehmaier, 

Chairman of Committee, Republican Club, 
54 West 40th Street, New York City. 

My Dear Mr. Lehmaier : 

Your letter of the i8th has been received. I am 
deeply sensible of the honor conferred upon me by my 
fellow members of the Republican Club in the passage 
of the resolution to which you refer, and it will give me 
pleasure to accept the invitation. In accepting it, it is 
proper for me to re-state my position : 

It is my desire that the sentiment of the party shall 
have the freest expression, and that such action shall be 
taken as will be for its best interests. 

I do not seek office nor shall I attempt to influence the 
selection or vote of any delegate. The State adminis- 
tration must continue to be impartial and must not be 
tributary to any candidacy. 

I have no interest in any fractional controversy, and 
desire above all things that there shall be deliberation, 
honest expression of the party will, and harmony of 
effort. 



I 



I 

1 



Correspondence with J. S. Lehmaier 39 

I cannot fail to recognize the great honor which the 
nomination would confer or the obligation of service 
which it would impose. Nor should I care to be thought 
lacking in appreciation of the confidence and esteem 
which prompt the efforts of those who sincerely desire 
to bring it about. The matter is one for the party to 
decide, and whatever its decision I shall be content. 

I shall be glad to meet with the members of the 
Club as you suggest, and to make such further statement 
as may be appropriate. In view of the engagements 
already made I do not see how it will be possible to 
have such a meeting before the evening of January 31st, 
And if that date suits your convenience, arrangements 
for the meeting may be made accordingly. 

Very truly yours, 

Charles E. Hughes. 



VI. 

Address before the Republican Club of the 
City of New York, January 31, 1908. 

Fellow Members of the Republicaii Chib : 

In the adoption of the resolutions which 
preceded the call of this meeting, you have 
conferred upon me an honor of which I cannot 
express adequately my appreciation. It is 
enhanced by the fact that it comes from old 
friends and associates — the fellow members of 
an organization with which it has been my 
privilege to be identified for twenty years, and 
from a body of loyal and earnest Republicans 
whose zeal for the welfare of the Republican 
party and unselfish devotion to its interests 
are known throughout the country. I cherish 
your friendship. I esteem your confidence. 
And in recoiinition of both, and of the oblitra- 
tion imposed upon me by your action, I shall 
define my position. 

Since I took office I have sous^ht to make 

it clear that I would not become involved in 

40 



New York, January 31, 1908 41 

factional strife or use the powers of office to 
further any personal interest. I am, and have 
been constantly, solicitous that the administra- 
tion of the affairs of this State shall not be 
embarrassed by collateral considerations, and 
that every question shall be presented and 
decided upon its merits, unaffected by sug- 
gestion of ulterior motives. For this reason I 
have avoided gratuitous discussion of questions 
foreign to my official duty. But when, in 
justice to those who have honored me with 
their confidence, and to the party which, as we 
all desire, should act freely and with full in- 
formation, it becomes a duty to speak, I have 
no desire to remain silent. Nor should I in 
any event care to preserve availability at the 
expense of candor. 

The Republican party is the party of sta- 
bility, and the party of progress. Its funda- 
mental policies have determined the course of 
the Nation's history. Largely, they are now 
without serious challenge and are removed 
from any controversy the issue of which might 
be regarded as doubtful. They include the 
policy of Union in opposition to every divisive 
sentiment or disrupting force. They include 
the policy of establishing the national credit 
upon a sure foundation, in opposition to those 



42 Charles Mvans Hughes 

financial vagaries which, paraded at one time 
with solemn argument and fervid appeal as 
the hope of the people, are now by common 
consent relegated to our museum of political 
absurdities, wholly amusing save for our keen 
appreciation of the peril we narrowly escaped. 
And they also include the policy of protection 
to American industry in the interest of the 
wage-earners of our country and in order to 
safecfuard those hitrher American standards of 
living which our people will never permit to 
be reduced. The Republican party has main- 
tained the national honor, and under Its direc- 
tion American diplomacy has attained the 
highest levels of honorable purpose and dis- 
tinguished achievement. The great names of 
the party are the priceless possession of the 
American people, who, irrespective of partisan 
affiliations, are grateful that the violence of 
opposition did not deprive the Nation of their 
leadership. 

The Republican party to-day is charged 
with weighty responsibility. By reason of its 
ascendancy in Congress nothing can be accom- 
plished save through its instrumentality. It 
has been the party of constructive statesman- 
ship, and with its present opportunities its 
destiny is in its own keeping. 



New York, January 31, 1908 43 

We are contemplating a new administration 
at the close of one which to a degree almost 
unparalleled has impressed the popular imagi- 
nation and won the confidence of the people. 
The country is under lasting obligation to 
President Roosevelt for his vigorous opposition 
to abuses and for the strong impulse he has 
given to movements for their correction. Dif- 
ferences of opinion now as always exist with 
regard to the best means of solving some of 
the extremely difficult problems that are pre- 
sented. But those who earnestly desire prog- 
ress and the establishment of our security on 
Its necessary foundations of fair dealing and 
recognition of equal rights, appreciate the 
great service he has rendered and the funda- 
mental importance of the purposes he has had 
in view. We shall have in the next campaign 
a notable vantage ground, gained through the 
general admiration of his strong personality 
and the popular appreciation of the intensity 
of his desire to promote the righteous conduct 
of affairs and the welfare of his fellow men. 

The most impressive revelation of modern 
history Is the picture it affords of the wide- 
spread struggle against every form of oppres- 
sion and exploitation, and the onward march 
of the people toward the realization of the 



44 Charles Evans Hus^^hes 



£>' 



ideals of self-cjovernment. This movement, 
sometimes checked by arbitrary power, some- 
times impeded by ignorance, sometimes suffering 
from the perversions of selfish ambition, some- 
times under the urgings of passion running 
into wanton excesses with their inevitable 
reactions, nevertheless broadly viewed is an 
irresistible movement ajrainst which in the 
long run the opposition of class or of privilege 
will be powerless to prevail. There is no rest 
in human affairs. The watchword of humanity 
is progress. And the administration of gov- 
ernment, in proportion to the enlightenment 
of the people, will reflect in ever-increasing 
degree their insistence upon the enjoyment of 
equal civil rights and upon the elimination of 
all evils which threaten equality of opportunity. 
In this country of extraordinary resources 
there are presented to an unprecedented de- 
gree the advantages of a free society. We 
are blessed with a system of government 
admirably adapted to maintain the rights 
and to safeguard the opportunities of all. It 
has not been desi^rned for the benefit of a 
few, but for the many. It is not a govern- 
ment for any class ; it is not a government 
for the holders of privilege ; it is not a gov- 
ernment for the talented or for the rich ; it is 



New York, January 31, 1908 45 

a government for the people, and it derives 
its strength and its assurance of permanence 
from the fundamental conception of equality 
before the law, and from the appreciation of 
the common rights of manhood. 

Our government is based upon the princi- 
ples of individualism and not upon those of 
socialism. It was not established to substitute 
one form of despotism for another. It was 
founded to attain the aims of liberty, of lib- 
erty under law, but wherein each individual 
for the development and the exercise of his 
individual powers might have the freest op- 
portunity consistent with the equal rights of 
all others, and wherein the rewards of industry 
and thrift, — the gains of honest effort, — might 
be secure. 

We do not seek to multiply the activities of 
government so as to bring about vexatious 
interference with liberty or to restrict legitimate 
enterprise. We deprecate all unnecessary gov- 
ernmental action. But our individualism does 
not justify unbridled license. Its aims may 
demand, and frequently do demand, the inter- 
vention of government with necessary restric- 
tions and regulations not to curtail the liberty 
of the people, but to protect it. Wherever, 
in order to maintain civil rights, to secure the 



46 Charles Evans Hughes 

public from aggression, or to compel the per- 
formance of public obligation, the action of the 
government as the organ of the popular will is 
necessary, there its power should be firmly, 
adequately, and impartially exercised. 

Now I do not profess to be able to speak 
the last word with regard to the questions 
which confront us. Many of them are diffi- 
cult, and in the effort to reach true conclusions 
mistakes may be inevitable. But before these 
are dealt with specifically we may properly 
make closer inquiry as to the principles which 
should be the guide of our action and to which 
we should render unquestioned allegiance. 

What are the conditions, so far as govern- 
ment is concerned, of progress in the United 
States ? 

There must be the freest opportunity for 
the honest expression of the popular will. To 
this end every practicable means should be 
employed to preserve the purity of the ballot. 
Political contributions from corporations have 
wisely been prohibited and publicity of cam- 
paign expenses should be enforced. The most 
stringent measures should be adopted to pre- 
vent corrupt practices. 

This is a representative government and 
not a pure democracy. The latter would be 



, New York, January 31, 1908 47 

unworkable in a country of this magnitude. 
Except with regard to fundamental questions 
or matters comparatively simple, it is imprac- 
ticable for the electorate directly to express 
its views. Our system presupposes the fidelity 
of the chosen representatives of the people. I 
believe in party government to enforce and 
apply party principles ; I believe in the re- 
sponsibility of party administration in accord- 
ance with the policies announced in the party 
platform. These policies are but the described 
methods of public service and the defined 
means believed to be conducive to the public 
welfare. In short, I believe in fidelity to 
principle, publicly professed, and in honorable 
obedience to the oath of office. Upon the 
fulfilment of these paramount fiduciary obli- 
gations, and upon the public intolerance of the 
perversion of the authority conferred by the 
people to the service of any private interest, 
the safety of our institutions depends. 

I also believe in securing the highest pos- 
sible degree of administrative efficiency. Our 
first object should be to derive from existing 
laws the maximum of benefit according to 
their intention. The firmness and the impar- 
tiality of justice in the execution of the laws 
insure that respect for law and order and that 



48 Charles Evans Hughes 



ti' 



stability of government which conditions ever}'' 
honorable enterprise and underlies the pros- 
perity of every man, whatever his work. 

The battle for free institutions has been a 
struggle against special privilege. It is not 
won merely by the creation of new forms of 
government. Against every attempt to make 
government the instrument of selfish purposes 
a free people must constantly be on the alert. 
Every franchise granted by the people is a 
privilege justified only by considerations of 
the public welfare, and the conditions of its 
exercise should be such as to insure the per- 
formance of public obligation. There must 
be no encroachment on the common right for 
the purpose of serving the interests of the few 
at the expense of the many. 

Of fundamental importance also is respect 
for the rights of property. This is the security 
of thrift. It is of even greater importance to 
the poor than to the rich. The unlawful 
acquisition of property should be prevented or 
punished. The conditions underlying grants 
of public franchises should be enforced. But 
property lawfully acquired must be safe- 
guarded. 

We are a nation of workers. Idlers are 
comparatively few. Our people are employed 



New York, January 31, 1908 49 

in a vast network of activities. We must 
respect the demands of industry and be solici- 
tous to promote the welfare of those who in 
ao^riculture, in manufacture, and in the various 
enterprises incident to the exchanges of com- 
merce are contributing to the sum of national 
effort. The prosperity of the nation means 
the prosperity of its millions of toilers. We 
are so interdependent that any disturbance or 
dislocation has a far-reaching effect, and their 
most injurious consequences are borne by 
those least able to endure disaster — the wage- 
earners and the men of limited resources. 
We desire to see the opportunities for labor 
protected and enlarged ; the conditions of 
labor improved ; the reasonable adjustment of 
controversies ; and above all we should seek 
to maintain stability and confidence, in order 
that the talent of our people for productive 
industry may have the widest scope for honor- 
able employment, and that we may enjoy to 
the greatest possible extent that widely dif- 
fused prosperity and happiness to which we 
are entitled by virtue of our resources and our 
energy. 

In this country progress cannot be made 
save in harmony with our constitutional sys- 
tem. The Constitution in its entirety must 



50 Charles Evans Hughes 

be observed. The power derived from the 
people must be exercised upon the conditions 
which they have laid down. The functions 
of each department of government — executive, 
legislative, and judicial — are defined, and the 
responsibilities of each department are fixed. 
The people have not only thus marked out 
the spheres and limited the powers of their 
representatives, but the provisions of our Con- 
stitutions are also checks upon the hasty and 
inconsiderate action of the people themselves. 
According to our system, the controlling will 
of the people is found in constitutional pro- 
visions, as interpreted and applied by the 
courts, and these must remain effective until 
the people change them by amending the 
Constitution in the prescribed manner. 

We must also recognize the division of 
powers between the Federal and the State 
governments. Through the latter, necessary 
local autonomy is secured. It is essential to 
the permanence of free institutions that each 
community should attend to its particular 
affairs ; and through the powers and responsi- 
bilities of local administration, independence, 
public spirit, and capacity for self-government 
are developed, which not only secure the en- 
forcement of local rights, but make possible 



New York, January 31, 1908 51 

the just exercise of the powers of the cen- 
tral authority over those matters lying outside 
the proper limits of local jurisdiction. 

These considerations are more and not less 
important because of the development of inter- 
state commerce and the powerful forces in the 
world of business which in their practical oper- 
ation ignore State lines. And the necessary 
extension of the activities of the Federal 
Government as to matters inevitably committed 
to its control should make us the more solici- 
tous that the administration of State govern- 
ments should show the hig'hest dep:ree of 
efficiency. 

There are two dangers. The one is that 
serious evils of national scope may go un- 
checked because Federal power is not ex- 
ercised. The other lies in an unnecessary 
exercise of Federal power, burdening the cen- 
tral authority with an attempted control which 
would result in the impairment of proper local 
autonomy, and extending it so widely as to 
defeat its purpose. It must be remembered 
that an evil is not the proper subject of Fed- 
eral cognizance merely because it may exist 
in many States. All sorts of evils exist in 
many States which should be corrected by the 
exercise of local power, and they are not evils 



52 Charles Evans Hughes 

of Federal concern although they may be 
widespread. 

On the other hand, it cannot be regarded as 
a policy of unwise centralization that, wherever 
there is a serious evil demanding govern- 
mental correction which afflicts interstate 
commerce and hence is beyond the control 
of the States, the power of Congress should 
unhesitatingly be exercised. 

But we are not left to the consideration of 
general principles of governmental action. 
Congress has the power given to it by the 
Constitution. It cannot, if it would, invade 
the rights of the States. It has express 
authority to regulate commerce among the 
several States. The scope of the interstate 
commerce clause and the boundaries of the 
Federal powers which it authorizes are the 
subject of determination by the Supreme 
Court. Congress can act only within the 
limits so fixed, and in acting within those 
limits, the question is not one of power 
but of the nature of the evil and of the appro- 
priate remedy for its cure. 

Having stated these principles I shall define 
briefly my position with regard to certain par- 
ticular questions. 

There is no matter of greater importance 



New York, January 31, 1908 53 

than the conservation and development of our 
natural resources. It is of the most urgent 
necessity that our forests should be protected, 
and that these priceless treasures should be 
preserved from ruthless destruction. All the 
property of the people should be safeguarded 
from spoliation. I am also deeply interested 
in the development of inland waterways, to 
provide increased and adequate facilities for 
our growing commerce. We should further 
do all in our power to extend the area of 
productive activity through irrigation and suit- 
able plans of reclamation. The common right 
in our public lands should be protected from 
encroachment, and wherever governmental 
power may properly be exercised the sole ob- 
ject should be the promotion of the general 
welfare, and all schemes of rapacity should be 
frustrated. 

I do not believe in governmental ownership 
of railroads. But regulation of interstate 
transportation is essential to protect the peo- 
ple from unjust discriminations and to secure 
safe, adequate, and impartial service upon 
reasonable terms in accordance with the obli- 
gations of common carriers. In order to have 
supervision which is both thorough and just 
an administrative board is necessary. I may 



54 Charles Evans Huo^hes 



assume that my attitude with regard to this 
matter is so well understood through my 
recommendations in relation to the enact- 
ment of the Public Service Commissions Law 
in this State that an extended statement is 
unnecessary. 

I approve the recent extension of the au- 
thority of the Interstate Commerce Commis- 
sion by what is known as the rate bill, and 
I believe that the Commission should have the 
most ample powers for purposes of investiga- 
tion and supervision, and for making rules and 
orders, which will enable it to deal to the full- 
est extent possible, within constitutional limits, 
with interstate transportation in all its phases. 

This is a just policy. The power of Con- 
gress to fix rates for interstate transportation 
so as to prevent improper discriminations and 
to compel carriage upon reasonable terms is 
undoubted. The sole question is how, and 
under what circumstances, it shall be exercised. 
But it is manifestly impossible for the legisla- 
tive body, on account of the conditions under 
which it works, to make that thorough exami- 
nation of specific cases which in justice must 
precede action. It may establish general 
standards of conduct, but the exigencies of 
particular cases can be met only by the pains- 



New York, January 31, I QoS 55 

taking consideration of an administrative 
board. The alternative to this poHcy is either 
the abandonment of regulation or sporadic 
legislative intervention under the influence of 
agitation and almost necessarily without proper 
examination of the facts or recognition of the 
different requirements of varied situations. 
No one can properly complain because legal 
machinery is provided for the rectification of 
abuses. And the aim should be to make the 
machinery adequate to the purpose of provid- 
ing redress for every grievance and to insist 
upon standards of administration which will 
secure intelligent and patient inquiry and 
impartial enforcement of the law. 

The Sherman Anti-trust Act should be clari- 
fied and made more explicit. The law may be 
made stronger and more effective by being 
made more definite. Sweeping condemnations, 
of uncertain meaning, do not aid but rather 
embarrass the prosecution of those who are 
guilty of pernicious practices. Combinations 
and practices in unreasonable restraint of trade 
and which menace the freedom of interstate 
commerce should be condemned in precise 
terms. At the same time provision may well 
be made for joint agreements, under proper 
circumstances, as to railroad rates, which should 



56 Charles Evans Hughes 

be subject to the approval of the Interstate 
Commerce Commission. 

Various means have been suggested — of 
doubtful validity and still more doubtful utility 
— to prevent oppression through the conduct 
of large enterprises, and to secure the enforce- 
ment of the law against illegal attempts to 
monopolize and the various devices resorted 
to in unlawful restraint of trade. In my judg- 
ment, the most effective course is explicit 
definition of what is wrong and adequate 
punishment of the guilty. Such laws, like laws 
in general which are definite and supported 
by public sentiment, are to a very large extent 
self-executing. That is, they are generally 
obeyed. 

I am not in favor of punishment in the shape 
of fines upon corporations, except for minor 
offences. The burden of fines imposed upon 
such corporations is either transferred to the 
public or is borne by stockholders, the innocent 
as well as the guilty. Nor am I impressed by 
the argument that American juries will gen- 
erally be indisposed to convict where the evi- 
dence is clear, because the crime is punished 
by imprisonment of the offenders. But if the 
law be definite and the evidence warrants the 
presentation of the case to the jury, it is better. 



New York, January 31, 1908 57 

in my judgment, that the responslbihty for 
failure to convict should lie with the jury than 
that conviction should be followed by penalties 
which are either inadequate or bear unjustly 
upon those who have had no complicity in the 
offence. 

I believe in a protective tariff. It is an es- 
tablished policy. Our opponents would not 
undertake to present to the voters of the 
country the issue of free trade. 

A protective tariff is essential to the interests 
of our wage-earners, in that it makes possible 
the payment of wages on the scale to which 
we are accustomed in this country and thus 
maintains our American standards of living. 
Hence the difference in the cost of produc- 
tion here and abroad is the fundamental 
consideration. 

But I do not believe in making this policy 
a cover for exorbitant rates or for obtaining 
special privileges from the government which 
are not based upon consideration of the gen- 
eral welfare. I believe that the tariff should 
be revised. And in order to effect whatever 
readjustment may be necessary to make the 
tariff schedules consistent with the principles 
underlying the protective policy, I favor the 
appointment of an expert commission, so that 



58 Charles Evans Hutrhes 



the facts may be ascertained without delay and 
that Congress may dispose of the matter in 
the fairest possible manner. 

So far as the matter is within the power of 
Congress, the interests of labor should be safe- 
guarded and the conditions of labor improved. 
I am in favor of the enactment of a law aptly 
expressed, to apply exclusively to interstate 
commerce, which would embody the princi- 
ples of the employers' liability bill recently 
declared unconstitutional because too broad. 
I also approve the laws which have been 
enacted with regard to safety appliances and 
hours of labor in railroad service. The matter 
of railroad accidents deserves special investi- 
gation, and every effort should be made to 
obtain adequate information which will lead 
to appropriate measures for the protection of 
life and limb. 

Wherever the government comes into direct 
relation to labor, proper conditions with regard 
to hours, wages, safety, and compensation for 
accidents should be provided. 

With regard to the Filipinos, we are placed 
under the most sacred obligations. In justice 
to them and in justice to ourselves, we must 
omit no effort to prepare them for self-govern- 
ment. When tliey are able to govern them- 



New York, January 3 1 , 1908 59 

selves and are in a position to maintain their 
independence, the American people will not 
deny them the boon which we ourselves have 
so highly prized. In the meantime, the work of 
education and training must proceed, and 
everything that can be done consistently with 
the interests of our own people must be done 
to promote their prosperity. 

We are devoted to the interests of peace 
and we cherish no policy of aggression. The 
maintenance of our ideals is our surest protec- 
tion. It is our constant aim to live in friend- 
ship with all nations and to realize the aims of 
a free government secure from the interrup- 
tions of strife and the wastes of war. It is 
entirely consistent with these aims, and it is 
our duty, to make adequate provision for our 
defence and to maintain the efficiency of our 
Army and Navy. And this I favor. 

Within the limits of this address, it has been 
possible to touch on only a few subjects which 
from a National standpoint are worthy of con- 
sideration. But I have endeavored to say 
enough to give suitable information of my 
attitude. 

We have no problems that cannot be solved. 
Our citizens are intelligent and alert. There 
are fresh evidences daily of quickened public 



6o Charles Evans Hughes 

spirit. The conscience of the people has been 
aroused and their common sense is not im- 
paired. Through the lavish provision for 
education and technical training, the un- 
exampled opportunities for cultivation and 
enjoyment, and the varied efforts of philan- 
thropy, we are making steady progress in the 
improvement of the conditions of our life. 

I do not believe in arbitrary action. We 
desire prosperity. We are anxious that there 
should be fair opportunities for all the work- 
ers of the land, for the extension of industry 
and commerce, and that there should be the 
widest diffusion of blessings among a con- 
tented people. 

To attain these ends, the rule of the people 
must be the rule of reason and every effort 
must be dominated by the sense of justice. 
We must be patient, impartial, and thorough ; 
investigation must precede action ; good-will 
must displace passion ; and the sole motive 
must be to seek the truth and to do the right. 

Fellow Republicans : I do not come before 
you in any spirit of rivalry or self-seeking. 
There are many Republicans who by virtue of 
their character and distinguished services are 
worthy of the highest honor the party can be- 
stow. I ask no favor and I make no claim. I 



New York, January 31, 1908 61 

desire that the party shall act for its best 
interest. 

We must not underestimate the labors of 
the next campaign. It will be a hard-fought 
battle. We cannot expect victory unless we 
are united, and nothing should be done to 
imperil success in this State. I appeal to you, 
in the name of the party to which you are all 
loyal, to forget every personal difference and 
to make the work which precedes the conven- 
tion a fitting preparation for the united effort 
which later will be essential. 

And let us not forget that the Republican 
party does not exist for itself. Our efforts on 
its behalf are justified by our conviction that 
through the party we may render patriotic 
service to the nation. Let this thought domi- 
nate our activities and love of country be the 
inspiration and the motive of every partisan 
effort. 



VII. 

Address at the Union League Club Meet- 
ing in the Auditorium at Chicago, 
Saturday, February 22, 1908. 

This day has summoned us to render grate- 
ful tribute to supreme patriotic service. With 
the progress of the years and the development 
of our National life swells the obligation to 
him through whose military genius independ- 
ence was won and through whose statesman- 
ship the foundations of the National structure 
were securely laid. 

But we do not simply commemorate vic- 
tories, even though they advanced a noble 
cause. We do not gather merely to praise 
tactics of strategy or daring, however brilliant 
the exploit or notable the result. Nor is it 
the skill of statecraft only which commands 
our homage. These may have their appropri- 
ate recognition. But this day has a deeper 
import. The victories of war and the leader- 
ship of peace were alike glorified by the 
character of the victor and leader. 

62 



Chicago, February 22, 1908 63 

We venerate Washington because in su- 
preme test he vindicated manliood. The 
standards of Hberty were unsulHed in his 
hands. Whether amid the hardships of long 
and discouraging campaigns or in the hours 
of triumph, whether as burden-bearer or idol 
of the people, he invariably exhibited the 
same purity of motive, the same patriotic 
devotion. Against all that is sordid and mean, 
against all that is petty and unworthy, against 
the ignoble contrivances and manipulations of 
the cunning and the artful, against the graspings 
of avarice and the schemlngs of selfishness, 
against every effort to make power and office 
contribute to personal gain, against all that is 
or has been hateful and harmful in our politi- 
cal life, stands in majestic contrast the char- 
acter of Washington, — an example and a 
benediction, a treasury of memory and a secur- 
ity of hope, — a character, the revelation of 
which ennobled humanity and enriched the 
world. 

The lesson of this life may be wholly missed 
by those who call with pride the battle-roll of 
the Revolution or who recount his distinctions 
and offices. It may make but slight impres- 
sion upon those who in the conventional man- 
ner exult In his deeds. It is a lesson we must 



64 Charles Evans Hughes 

all take to heart if we are to realize American 
ideals. It is the lesson of the supremacy of 
duty. It is the lesson of honor, — of fidelity 
to trust. It must be enforced in executive 
chambers, in legislative halls, in courts of jus- 
tice, in newspaper offices, in banks, in trust 
and insurance companies, in professional and 
commercial life, in the marts of trade, in the 
counting-room, and in the shop, by employer 
and employed. 

There is no les^islative road to character. 
If the spirit of Washington could permeate 
our public and private life, we should neither 
need nor seek governmental panacea. And it 
is only in so far as in fact this spirit imbues 
administration that the government of a free 
people can perform its function. We shall 
largely lose the value of the celebrations of 
this day if we give our thought exclusively to 
questions of governmental policy and omit 
to emphasize the moral sources from which a 
just government must derive its strength. 

Washington did not seek power or prefer- 
ment. The sense of responsibility outweighed 
the appreciation of distinction. When he was 
appointed to the command of the Continental 
forces he wrote to the President of Congress : 

" Though I am truly sensible of the high honor done 



Chicago, February 22, 1908 65 

me in this appointment, yet I feel great distress from the 
consciousness that my abilities and military experience 
may not be equal to the extensive and important trust. 
However, as the Congress desire it, I will enter upon the 
momentous duty and exert every power I possess in the 
service for the support of the glorious cause. ... As 
to pay. Sir, I beg leave to assure the Congress that as 
no pecuniary consideration could have tempted me to 
accept this arduous employment at the expense of my 
domestic ease and happiness, I do not wish to make 
any profit from it. I will keep an exact account of my 
expenses. Those I doubt not they will discharge, and 
that is all I desire." 

With tenacity of purpose that has never 
been excelled, and an unconquerable spirit, he 
addressed himself to his task ; and when, after 
years of struggle, victory was won, he scorned 
the temptations of power and yearned for 
peaceful retirement. Perils could not terrify 
him ; defeat could not dishearten him ; exer- 
tion did not exhaust him. Nor could success 
undermine him or victory disturb his poise. 
Duty never made her imperious demands upon 
him in vain. But that he should turn an 
opportunity for service or the advantages of 
performance to his personal gain, was to him 
unthinkable. 

When prompted by the discontent of an 
army which despite its victories Congress neg- 
lected, the suggestion that his successes and 



66 Charles Evans Hughes 

prestige might enable him by the exercise of 
monarchial power to establish a firm and just 
government, he replied : " Let me conjure you, 
if you have any regard for your country, con- 
cern for yourself or posterity, or respect for 
me, to banish these thoughts from your mind 
and never communicate as from yourself or 
any one else, a sentiment of the like nature." 

Ending his military labors, he expected, as 
he told his friends, to " move gently down the 
stream of life until he slept with his fathers." 
And when, after the adoption of the Constitu- 
tion, he was called as the head of the new 
government to the constructive labors of peace, 
he manifested the same modest dignity and 
the same patriotic devotion which characterized 
him when he had taken command of the army. 
As he said: "When I had judged, upon the 
best appreciation I was able to form of the 
circumstances which related to myself, that it 
was my duty to embark again on the tem- 
pestuous and uncertain ocean of public life, I 
gave up all expectations of private happiness 
in this world." And through the two terms 
of service that followed, but one purpose ran ; 
and that was firmly to establish the govern- 
ment and to leave nothing undone upon his 
part which could promote the welfare of his 



Chicago, February 22, 1908 67 

fellow citizens. He bequeathed to his country- 
men the priceless memory of service of ex- 
traordinary beneficence which had in it no 
alloy of self-seeking or base motive. 

Intelligent comparison of the conditions of 
this day with those in times past cannot fail 
to cause gratification and to beget confidence. 
The evils which we lament should not blind 
us to the progress which has been made and 
is being made. 

In the throes of the revolutionary struggle, 
when it would be supposed that the supreme 
cause of liberty and the valor and sacrifices of 
great leaders would inflame all hearts with 
patriotic ardor, Washington in an outburst of in- 
dignation at the indifference and venality which 
in fact were exhibited, thus described the times 
in a letter to Benjamin Harrison in December, 
1778: 

" If I was to be called upon to draw a picture of the 
times and of Men, from what I have seen, and heard, 
and in part know, I should in one word say that idleness, 
dissipation & extravagance seems to have laid fast hold 
of most of them. That speculation — peculation — and 
an insatiable thirst for riches seems to have got the better 
of every other consideration and almost of every order 
of Men." 

And about a year later he exclaimed : 



68 Charles Evans Hughes 



" But alas, virtue and patriotism are almost kicked out ! 
Stock jobbing, speculation, engrossing, etc., etc., seems 
to be the great business of the day & of the multitude, 
whilst a virtuous few struggle, lament & suffer in silence, 
though I hope not in vain." 

They did not suffer in vain ; and through 
their labors and under the beneficent working 
of the institutions which they founded each 
generation has attained higher levels in char- 
acter and achievement. The " cordial, habit- 
ual, and immovable attachment" for the 
Union has come to be cherished as Washing- 
ton desired. The name of " American," as 
he ardently wished, does "exalt the just pride 
of patriotism more than any appellation de- 
rived from local discriminations." A vast 
development, an interweaving of interests, and 
a facility of communication of which he could 
not even dream, have given rise to a National 
sentiment which is intense and dominating in 
every part of the Union. 

The country is morally sound. Its stand- 
ards of business were never higher. In this 
land of industr}^ with unexampled opportuni- 
ties for production and exchange, with an area 
and a population enjoying advantages of dis- 
tribution free from artificial barriers of inter- 
course such as the world has never seen, the 



Chicago, February 22, 1908 69 

men of business inevitably represent the intel- 
lio-ence and moral sentiment of the people. 
They do not constitute a caste. They come 
from every walk in life : from the farm, the 
college, the counting-room, and the shop. 
They represent every element in the popula- 
tion, native and foreign born, of every degree 
of advantage and disadvantage in origin and 
environment. Every stimulus to ambition, 
every precept of morality, every counsel of 
experience, every success and every disaster, 
every lesson of the past, and the multiform 
warnings of a world where truth and justice 
alone win lasting victories, have helped to 
shape their standards and to determine their 
aims. And making all allowance for the ex- 
tremes of avarice and artifice, for the unwhole- 
some spectacles of exploitation and infidelity 
to trust, without blinking any evil or glossing 
over any wrong, the fact remains that the busi- 
ness men of the country are for the most part 
honest men, representing fairly the moral 
standards of the people. And never more 
than to-day have they, taken as a whole, earn- 
estly desired that abuses shall be stopped, that 
an end be put to corrupt dealings and unfair 
practices, that gambling shall not parade in 
business livery, and that American industry 



yo Charles Evans Hughes 

and trade shall have free scope for develop- 
ment and extension alono; the lines of honor- 
able rivalry and with justice to stockholders, to 
employees, and to the people at large. 

There is a temporary slowing down of the 
wheels of industry. Amid uncertainty and 
hesitation, enterprise waits impatient. Men 
in large numbers are unemployed who should 
be employed, and new undertakings and ex- 
tensions of existing plants, which would pro- 
vide further opportunities for labor, are not 
going forward as they should go forward. The 
interests of industry are not the interests of a 
class, but of all of the people. What the rich 
man feels in the reduction of the value of his 
securities, what those dependent upon the re- 
turns from investments feel in the impairment 
of their income, the wage-earner feels still 
more acutely as business contracts and the loss 
of employment confronts him with starvation 
save as charity, hateful to his self-respect, may 
interpose. It is well to trace the economic 
causes which have produced this condition, and 
needed readjustments must be made. 

But it is absolutely essential that we should 
have the tonic of a wholesome confidence. 
Not the confidence of icrnorance or indiffer- 

O 

ence, blind to wrong and deaf to appeals 



Chicago, February 22, 1908 71 

against injustice, but the confidence which is 
inspired by the vision of the forces of right and 
a just appreciation of our material and moral 
strength. Pessimists and cynics cannot de- 
velop this country. We must have confidence 
in the stability of our institutions, in the sanity 
of the people, and in their realization of what 
underlies our prosperity. We must take ac- 
count of progress in education ; the dissemina- 
tion of information ; the increased capacity for 
discriminating judgments ; the uplifting power 
of the myriad efforts which in every community 
make for better living and higher standards of 
conduct. We are far from perfect, and it is 
well that we should be stirred by the daily 
revelations of weakness and of vice. But there 
is no occasion for misgiving. To distrust the 
future in this land of opportunity, of educa- 
tional privileges so eagerly seized, of moral 
influences so widespread and effective, is to 
despair of humanity itself. Here, progress 
Is the child of aspiration wedded to common 
sense. Let us dismiss vague alarms and go 
forward with calm confidence in the integrity 
and destiny of the American people. 

We have only begun to develop the com- 
merce of this country. The realization of 
Its possibilities awaits improvements which 



72 Charles Evans Huo^hes 



t>' 



we must undertake in a systematic manner. 
Washington with his usual farsightedness was 
deeply interested in the development of facili- 
ties of communication for the purpose of pro- 
motinor commercial intercourse and creatingr 
community of interest. Repeatedly he out- 
lined schemes of internal improvements and 
connection of waterways, and the Chesapeake 
and Ohio Canal had its origin in these projects 
which were never absent from his thought. 
My own State has ever appreciated the im- 
portance of work of this description, to which 
the Erie Canal bears witness. And it is now 
engaged in a stupendous undertaking of canal 
improvement, the intelligent and efficient pros- 
ecution of which is of serious consequence to 
our commercial interests. But while here and 
there much has been done, there has been 
wanting a realization of the need of a compre- 
hensive plan for the improvement of inland 
waterways from the standpoint of National 
interest. President Roosevelt, with his keen 
desire to advance the National interests and 
his usual force, has emphasized this, and we 
may be said to be entering upon a new era of 
commercial development. We take just pride 
in our present enterprise and achievements, 
but we may believe that the commerce of the 



Chicago, February 22, 1908 73 

future will as far exceed that of the present as 
the varied production, the vast extent of com- 
mercial exchanges, and the means of communi- 
cation of to-day transcend the hopes and even 
the dreams of Washington. 

This is no time for discouragement or halt- 
ing, but for appreciation of American oppor- 
tunity, and for that intelligent and united 
effort by which alone we can avail of it and 
deserve the blessings of posterity. 

To support this confidence and to gain these 
ends we must have a settled governmental 
policy. And it must be a right policy. 

It must be a policy consistent with the 
genius of our institutions. The people of this 
country do not desire Socialism even as an 
experiment. They do not propose to pass 
through a dreadful "quarter of an hour" of 
revolutionary changes to satisfy themselves of 
those imperfections of human nature of which 
they are already well apprised, and which 
make impossible the permanent constitution 
of society in accordance with socialistic theory. 
We must make progress and it must be steady 
and consistent, conserving what is good and 
safeguarding the opportunities for honest 
effort. Otherwise gains will be offset by un- 
necessary losses and expert accountants may 



74 Charles Evans Hughes 

search in vain for a credit balance. We may 
accomplish needed reforms by making our in- 
stitutions work as they were intended to work, 
and by effecting, in the light of the benefits 
thus secured, such changes as experience 
may commend and deliberate judgment may 
approve. 

It must be a policy consistent with our 
constitutional limitations and distribution of 
powers. These are the words of Washington 
in his Farewell Address : 

" This government, the offspring of our own choice un- 
influenced and unawed, adopted upon full investigation 
and mature deliberation, completely free in its principles, 
in the distribution of its powers, uniting security with 
energy, and containing within itself a provision for its 
own amendment, has a just claim to your confidence and 
your support. Respect for its authority, compliance with 
its laws, acc^uiescence in its measures, are duties enjoined 
by the fundamental maxims of true liberty. The basis 
of our political systems is the right of the people to make 
and to alter their constitutions of government. But the 
Constitution which at any time exists 'till changed by an 
explicit and authentic act of the whole people, is sacredly 
obligatory upon all." 

There are, of course, borderlands where the 
line of demarcation between Federal and State 
authority has not been clearly defined by judi- 
cial decision. The content of grants of power 



Chicago, February 22, 1908 75 

has been better appreciated as the course 
of experience has revealed the importance of 
the grants and their application to National 
exigencies. Differences of opinion undoubt- 
edly exist, as they will continue to exist, — 
influenced by differences of viewpoint and of 
political and economic theory, — with regard to 
the extent of Federal powers under the great 
clauses of the Constitution. These differences 
must be resolved, and for that purpose we 
have a final arbiter in the Supreme Court. 
Let such matters be frankly debated with a 
clear understanding on the part of the people 
as to the manner in which they must be de- 
cided. We secure our peace and confidence 
by loyal acceptance of the decisions of our 
umpires. Wherever constitutional provision is 
clear in its application or has been construed 
authoritatively we must avoid confusion by 
recognizing the fact and direct our plans ac- 
cordingly, unless and until a change be effected 
in the manner which the Constitution provides. 
We should not expect from the Nation what 
the States alone can give ; nor because a 
National remedy is denied for want of Federal 
power should we fail to insist upon the exer- 
cise of the power which resides in our State 
governments. 



76 Charles Evans Hughes 

By making our institutions work in the way 
in which they were intended to work, I mean 
that we should secure the rnaxinuim efficiency 
in both State and Federal administration to 
the end that every matter of National concern 
and every matter of local concern shall receive, 
by the appropriate exercise of the powers of 
each jurisdiction, that full consideration and 
necessary remedial action by which wrongs, 
both National and local, may be completely 
redressed. 

What then, under these conditions, are some 
of the important features of the policy which 
will support our confidence and insure our 
stability ? 

Special interests must keep their hands off 
the government in city. State and Nation. The 
common welfare must be the supreme law. 
The lobbies which have been maintained in 
legislative halls, the efforts to pervert ad- 
ministration by securing the service for par- 
ticular interests of those who pose as the 
servants of the people, the corruption of the 
sole means by which the people can express 
their will, have been the effective causes of 
distrust in government and furnish the most 
serious pretext for assaults upon our institu- I 
tions. Every attempt of this sort which has I 



Chicago, February 22, 1908 77 

proved successful has sown the seeds of dis- 
content which argument finds it difficuh to 
allay. The people do not discriminate with 
ease between the word and the speaker. They 
will not listen to the voice of reason if it pro- 
ceeds from the mouth of the briber or the 
bribed. They who would have sanity of judg- 
ment and reasonable solution of difficult ques- 
tions should see to it that they do not stir 
the people to indignation by the corruption of 
representative government. They must trust 
the people and rely upon their good faith and 
sense of justice. In the long run they will not 
be disappointed if they themselves keep faith 
and respect the institutions whose protection 
they invoke. 

But while we insist upon pure administra- 
tion and the unselfish fidelity of public officers, 
we must visit deserved contempt upon those 
who profit by indiscriminate detraction of men 
in public life. If the people would be served 
faithfully they must show their esteem of faith- 
ful service. Otherwise the holding of public 
office becomes a school of cynicism. I am 
glad to testify to the many whom I have met 
in public life whose motives and whose actions 
conform to the best standards. Our public 
service is far more wholesome than many 



78 Charles Evans Hughes 

people think. If they are intent upon it 
and just in criticism, the people can have the 
representation and the administration that 
they desire. 

Wherever there are public rights in forests, 
in lands, in mines, in water powers, they must 
be safeguarded and protected from spoliation. 
Wherever the public grants a privilege, it must 
be upon consideration of the common benefit 
and under conditions which insure to the pub- 
lic a proper return for the grant. We must 
guard our ranges, our coal deposits, our public 
lands, our forest treasures, by suitable restric- 
tions. No selfish interest must be permitted 
to seize with covetous hand the public domain. 

It must also be taken to be a settled policy 
that there shall be complete, effective, and 
just supervision of our railroads. I do not 
believe in arbitrary action with regard to these 
important concerns either by Congress or by 
State legislatures or by commissions. The 
railroads are not the enemies but the servants 
of the people. To secure proper service they 
must be subject to regulation. It must be 
taken as firmly established that the evils of 
rebating and of unjust discrimination will not 
be tolerated, and that adequate and impartial 
service upon reasonable terms will be insisted 



Chicago, February 22, 1908 79 

upon. There must be machinery through 
which pubHc obligations as defined by law- 
may be enforced. This can best be obtained 
through an administrative board such as the 
Interstate Commerce Commission. The ques- 
tion of rates must be determined after full 
consideration of all pertinent facts, to the end 
that the requirements of impartiality and rea- 
sonableness may be complied with, while at 
the same time a fair return to the owners of 
the property may be assured. Nothing should 
be lacking in administrative powers for the 
attainment of these objects. 

It is most mischievous to permit known 
abuses to remain the subject of general 
agitation without providing proper methods 
for the consideration and redress of specific 
grievances. And there is no more beneficial 
exercise of power than to allay distrust by 
providing administrative means for investiga- 
tion, for necessary publicity, and the even, 
constant, and just enforcement of the law. 

It is now recognized that this policy is im- 
portant to the railroads as well as to the 
public. In promoting fair dealing it must 
prove the security of honorable enterprise 

It is also essential that there should be effi- 
cient supervision of the issue of securities to 



8o Charles Evans Hughes 

avoid the evils of inflation and of over-capitaliza- 
tion. The interests of the public and of stock, 
holders must be guarded against the imposition 
of unjust burdens and corrupt manipulations. 
There should be every facihty for the pro- 
vision of betterments, for desirable extensions 
and improvements. The action of government 
should never be an obstacle in the way of in- 
creasing and perfecting service. But careful 
investigation and deliberate action under laws 
aimed to secure impartiality and open dealing 
provide a guaranty with which neither the 
railroads nor the public can afford to dispense. 
Other problems are presented with reference 
to industrial corporations. There are in exist- 
ence plants which make useful articles of com- 
merce. They employ thousands of workmen. 
We need the commodities. The workmen 
need the employment. We wish to see Ameri- 
can industry expand. We desire every ad- 
vantage of economic organization ; every just 
opportunity for the display of talent and 
inventive skill; every possible improvement in 
the processes of manufacture ; everything — in 
short — which enhances the opportunities of 
labor and its fruitful employment at good 
wages and which develops and encourages 
trade. 



Chicago, February 22, 1908 81 

At the same time we desire to put an end 
to unfair practices, unjustifiable preferences, 
and oppressive proceedings by which, apart 
from proper economic advantages or superior 
skill in industry, rivals are barred from equal 
opportunities and thrust out of the way or 
destroyed. This country is full of men with 
a talent for industry. They are entitled to a 
fair show. No one can complain if his rival 
has a larger factory, greater skill in manage- 
ment, more economical processes, or turns out 
better wares. But in a free country it is in- 
tolerable that one should be denied equal 
access to markets by discriminating rates or 
allowances, or that he should be the victim of 
a conspiracy to deprive him of his business, or 
that he should be crushed by the misuse of 
large aggregations of capital in unfair com- 
petition. Nor should a premium be placed 
upon such practices, or an incentive be given 
to extortion, by permitting the piling up of 
securities which do not fairly represent value 
and upon which returns cannot be earned by 
fair means. 

To meet these objects, and to prevent op- 
pression and extortion, it is not necessary that 
business should be involved in uncertainty or 
that legitimate effort should be handicapped. 



82 Charles Evans Hus^hes 



c3 



The enforcement of just laws has no terrors 
for legitimate business. 

But laws, State and Federal, should be as 
definite as possible, and should apply with be- 
coming precision to the practices sought to be 
reached. It was seven years after the Sher- 
man Act was passed before it was determined 
that it applied to railroads. It was nine years 
before it received illuminatinof construction in 
the Addyston case. The courts have been put 
to unnecessary labor in endeavoring to ascer- 
tain what Congress meant. It has lono- been 
found inadvisable to attempt a precise defini- 
tion of fraud, and it is impossible in any statute 
to describe to the last deo^ree of certitude the 
cases which should fall within the purview of 
its clear intent. But it is possible and ad- 
visable in dealing with this subject that there 
should be a more explicit and appropriate 
statement than we now have in the Sherman 
Act ; that fair agreements as to railroad rates 
which may receive the approval of the Inter- 
state Commerce Commission, and that associ- 
ations and agreements for reasonable and 
obviously proper purposes should not be in- 
cluded in a sweeping condemnation ; that it 
should point with a more definite aim at the 
evils which afflict interstate commerce and for 



Chicago, February 22, 1908 83 

which it is in the power of Congress to provide 
a remedy. 

The evils in question will not be eradicated 
by mere changes in forms of organizations. It 
does not make very great difference whether 
those engaged in improper enterprise keep its 
proceeds in one pocket or in three, or whether 
their transactions are detailed in one or more 
sets of accounts. The way to get rid of abuses 
is to attack them directly. And I believe 
the most efficacious means is definition and 
proscription, and adequate punishment of 
offenders. 

The justification of a penalty must be found 
in either its punitive or its deterrent effect. 
In their punitive aspect penalties cannot be 
justified unless their incidence is just. In their 
deterrent aspect they cannot be justified unless 
they make unlikely a repetition of the offence. 
Fines upon corporations, particularly upon 
large corporations with monopolistic powers, 
are just from neither point of view. They 
are easily transferred to the public, and to the 
extent that they may not be, they are borne 
by stockholders who in large numbers are 
without knowledge of the wrong or power to 
prevent its commission. They do not satis- 
factorily act as a deterrent, because they involve 



84 Charles Evans Hughes 



merely the payment of money, the loss of 
\vhich is widely shared or may readily be 
repaired. 

The punishment is most salutary when 
visited upon the guilty individuals. Few men 
can be hired to go to jail. And if offences 
which public sentiment recognizes to be of a 
grave character are punished by imprison- 
ment, the law is more likely to be obeyed and 
the punishment to have its intended effect. 

The security of business depends upon just 
and definite laws and their impartial enforce- 
ment. It depends upon the possibility of pre- 
vision and of a reasonable degree of certainty 
in the operations of trade. The business men 
of the country in large majority desire fair 
dealinor and the maintenance of the standards 
of honorable business conduct. And in every 
just endeavor to obtain these ends we may be 
assured that we shall have their co-operation. 

We cannot on this day afford to ignore the 
sentiments which must be the mainspring of 
every effort of democracy. 

We do not exist for the sake of National 
power or to confer upon a favored few the 
blessings of fortune. Paltry would be our suc- 
cess if we could simply rival in National great- 
ness the despotisms of the past or could prove 



Chicago, February 22, 1908 85 

only by the prosperity of a few the benefits of 
a free government. We exist that there may 
be the widest possible diffusion of opportunity 
and prosperity. In our legislation and admin- 
istration we must favor no class, but protect 
the interests of all our citizens. While the 
Nation may devote its powers to this end so 
far as matters are within Federal control, our 
State governments and local communities must 
not miss their great opportunities. In the use 
of all these powers, according to the consti- 
tutional distribution, for the development of 
our resources, the encouragement of agricul- 
ture, the improvement of the conditions of 
labor, and the safeguarding of the freedom 
of commerce, we shall progress toward the 
attainment of the aims of liberty. 

Let us realize our mutual dependence and 
rejoice with Washington, not in power, but in 
service ; not in distinction, but in duty well 
performed ; not in what we have gained, but in 
what we have given. And as with him may 
" the benign influence of good laws under a 
free government" be the "ever favorite object 
of our hearts and the public reward of our 
mutual cares, labors, and dangers." 



11. 



Regulation of Public Service 
Corporations 



"' I am here retained by the people of the State of New 
York to see that justice is done a?id with no disposition to 
i?ijure any investment^ but with every desire to give the 
fullest opportunity to enterprise and with every purpose to 
shield and protect every fust property interest. I stand for 
the people of the State of New York against extortion, 
against favoritism, against financial scandal, and against 
everything that goes to corrupt our politics, by interferetice 
with the freedom of our Legislature and administration. I 
stafid for honest government and effective regulation by the 
State of public-service corporations." — From Governor 
Hughes's Speech before the Elmira Chamber of Com- 
merce, May 3, 1907. 



87 



I. 

Message to the Legislature, January 2, 
1907, Recommending the Passage of 
a Public-Service Commissions Law. 

Proper means for the regulation of the 
operations of railroad corporations should be 
supplied. For want of it, pernicious favoritism 
has been practised. Secret rebates have been 
allowed, and there have been unjust discrimi- 
nations in rates and in furnishinof facilities for 
transportation. Those who have sought to 
monopolize trade have thus been enabled to 
crush competition and to grow in wealth and 
power by crowding out their rivals who have 
been deprived of access to markets upon equal 
terms. These abuses are not to be tolerated. 
Congress has legislated upon the subject with 
reference to interstate commerce, where natu- 
rally the evil has been most prominent. But 
domestic commerce must be regulated by the 
State, and the State should exercise its power 
to secure impartial treatment to shippers and 

the maintenance of reasonable rates. There 

89 



90 Charles Evans Hu^^hes 



is also need of regulation and strict supervision 
to ensure adequate service and due regard for 
the convenience and safety of the public. The 
most practicable way of attaining these ends 
is for the Legislature to confer proper power 
upon a subordinate administrative body. 

We have now a Board of Railroad Com- 
missioners of five members. It is charged 
specifically with important duties. The exe- 
cution of mortgages and the increase or reduc- 
tion of capital stock are subject to its approval, 
its certificate that public convenience and 
necessity require the construction of a pro- 
jected railroad is required before construction 
can be besfun, and it deals with chancres in 
highway grade crossings, and various other 
matters in a definitive way. 

The law also provides that the board " shall 
have general supervision of all railroads and 
shall examine the same and keep informed as 
to their condition and the manner in which 
they are operated for the security and accom- 
modation of the public and their compliance 
with the provisions of their charters and of 
law." If in the judgment of the board it ap- 
pears " that any change of the rates of fare 
for transporting freight or passengers or in 
the mode of operating the road or conducting 



Public-Service Commissions 91 

its business is reasonable and expedient in 
order to promote the security, convenience, 
and accommodation of the public," it may 
after notice and hearing fix a time within 
which the changes shall be made. 

But the action of the board in the exercise 
of this general power of supervision amounts 
to a recommendation. If its direction is not 
complied with, the law provides that the mat- 
ter shall be presented to the Attorney-General 
for his consideration and action, and shall be 
reported to the Legislature. So, if it appears 
that any railroad corporation has violated the 
law or unjustly discriminates in its charges, 
and the wrongful conduct is continued after 
notice, the matter is to be brought to the 
attention of the Attorney-General, " who shall 
take such proceedings thereon as may be 
necessary for the protection of the public 
interests." 

The present scheme of regulation is inade- 
quate. There is a lack of precision in the 
definition of the powers of the board and an 
absence of suitable means to compel compli- 
ance with its decisions. No penalties are 
provided for disobedience to orders of the 
board made within its proper authority. 
Nor is the board authorized to institute and 



92 Charles Evans Huorhes 



conduct legal proceedings for the purpose of 
enforcing its requirements. 

It is also provided that the expenses of the 
commission shall be borne by the railroad 
corporations upon the apportionment of the 
Comptroller. This plan of reimbursing the 
State is wholly indefensible. The supervision 
of railroads is in the interest of all the people 
and should be borne by the people as any 
other expense of administration. Such a board 
should be established in public confidence as 
an independent governmental body receiving 
no support from the railroads save as they 
are duly taxed for the general support of the 



ofovernment. 



We have also a Commission of Gas and 
Electricity with broad powers with reference 
to corporations engaged in supplying gas and 
electric current. 

It is my judgment that there is no need of 
two separate commissions to deal with these 
subjects. There are now corporations which 
are subject to the jurisdiction of both commis- 
sions and in some cases the same questions 
are presented for the decision of both. Simi- 
lar principles are applicable to the decision 
in many cases within the jurisdiction of each 
and harmony of administration would be 



Public-Service Commissions 93 

promoted by having a single body. It is plainly 
in the interest of economic adminstration, in 
order to avoid the unnecessary multiplication 
of officers and clerical force, that there should 
be but one commission. In the two boards 
we have now eight commissioners. A board 
of less than this number would answer both 
purposes. 

I therefore recommend that the present 
Board of Railroad Commissioners and the 
Commission of Gas and Electricity be abol- 
ished and that a new commission be con- 
stituted, with powers of regulation and 
supervision, within constitutional limits, of the 
corporations now subject to the existing com- 
missions. The commission should have all 
the powers possessed by the present commis- 
sions and such additional powers as may be 
needed to insure proper management and 
operation. Its powers should be clearly de- 
fined and should embrace the power to act 
upon its own initiative as well as upon com- 
plaint ; to pass upon the issue of stocks and 
bonds; to examine properties, books, and 
accounts ; to require detailed reports in pre- 
scribed form ; to prescribe reasonable rates ; 
to require adequate and impartial service ; to 
provide for the safety of employees and for 



94 Charles Evans Hughes 

the protection of the pubhc ; and generally to 
direct whatever may be necessary or proper to 
safeguard the public interests and to secure 
the fulfilment of the public obligations of the 
corporations under its supervision. Provision 
should be made for suitable inspection so that 
the commission may be advised as to all mat- 
ters within its purview and be in a position to 
take action on behalf of the people without 
the formal institution of proceedings by com- 
plainants. A prescribed quorum should be 
entitled to decide all questions, and any one 
commissioner should be empowered to make 
examinations and investigations, and the pro- 
ceedings and decisions of one, when approved 
by the board, should stand as its proceedings 
and decisions. 

The corporation guilty of disobedience to 
its orders, and all officers and other persons 
responsible for such disobedience, should be 
visited with appropriate penalties. The com 
mission should also be entitled to institute 
legal proceedings for the enforcement of its 
orders, and all such proceedings should be 
expedited by suitable preference in all the 
courts of the State. The Legislature should 
thus provide, within its constitutional power, 
adequate means for the entirely just and 



Public-Service Commissions 95 

impartial regulation of these important public 
enterprises. 

The problem of transportation in the terri- 
tory of Greater New York demands special, 
prompt, and comprehensive treatment The 
configuration of Manhattan Island and the 
concentration of business at its lower end, 
together with the rapid growth of population, 
have produced an extraordinary congestion. 
All the existing lines, surface, elevated, and 
subway, are overburdened and the people suf- 
fer in mind, body, and estate. The worst con- 
gestion is at the Brooklyn Bridge, due to the 
convergence at that point of the Brooklyn 
traffic. The people of Brooklyn who do busi- 
ness in Manhattan are subjected morning and 
night, not only to exasperating inconvenience, 
but to such maltreatment and indignities inci- 
dent to their dlsG^raceful herdingr that relief in 
the most practicable manner should be afforded 
them at the earliest possible moment. 

Not only are new facilities needed, which 
should be planned with reference both to im- 
mediate and future needs, but there is urgent 
necessity for more strict supervision to secure 
better service on existing lines. In some por- 
tions of the city antiquated horse-cars may 
still be seen, giving picturesque emphasis to 



96 Charles Evans Hughes 

the disregard of the pubhc convenience. Over- 
capitaHzation and the improvident creation of 
guaranties and fixed charges to suit the exi- 
crencies of successive combinations entered 
into for the purpose of monopohzing the traf- 
fic have produced their natural results. There 
are such unjust burdens upon earnings and the 
tendency constantly to effect economies at the 
expense of proper service is so strong that it 
is imperative that the people shall have vigil- 
ant representatives clothed with ample author- 
ity to compel the corporations to perform 
their public duty. 

In 1 89 1, the Legislature, for the purpose of 
providing for the development of additional 
transit facilities, passed the so-called Rapid 
Transit Act. It constituted a Board of Rapid 
Transit Commissioners, who were named in 
the statute. Numerous amendments have 
been made and additional powers conferred. 
The statute contains important provisions 
with reference to construction by the city. 
Through the accretions of years it has become 
cumbersome and extremely complicated. It 
needs revision. Pursuant to the provisions of 
this act the present subways have been con- 
structed and plans have been made for further 
construction. By a recent amendment the 



Public-Service Commissions 97 

board is authorized, with the consent of 
the Board of Estimate and Apportionment 
of the city, to grant rights and franchises and 
to make contracts with reference to the con- 
struction and operation of the parts within the 
city of interstate trunk Hnes. 

We have thus in the city of New York an 
anomalous condition. Two boards created 
by the Legislature are exercising powers of 
the greatest importance with reference to 
transportation. The Board of Rapid Transit 
Commissioners is dealing with the question of 
new facilities and is empowered to make con- 
tracts for construction and operation. It is 
also dealing with the question of the construc- 
tion of trunk lines into or across the city. 
The State Board of Railroad Commissioners 
has general jurisdiction over the railroads of 
the State and has supervisory powers over the 
surface lines and the elevated roads in the 
city. It does not exercise jurisdiction over 
the subways, as these were constructed under 
the Rapid Transit Act. But while the powers 
of supervision are divided, the interests in 
control of the surface, elevated, and subway 
lines are now united in a single corporation. 

This situation should be met by a compre- 
hensive plan. All the operations of railroad 



98 Charles Evans Hughes 



companies in the territory of Greater New 
York should be under the supervision of one 
board. And the board that is to have the 
power to supervise generally these operations 
should have the power of initiating plans and 
of making contracts for the construction and 
operation of new lines. Instead of two boards 
dealing with different phases of the same 
problem, there should be one board empow- 
ered to deal with it in its entirety. As such a 
board would exercise important State powers 
of control and regulation, it should be a 
State board, and should be composed of 
men familiar with conditions in the territory 
affected. In my judgment it would not be 
advisable to put all these matters under 
the control either of the present Board of 
Railroad Commissioners or of the new com- 
mission which I have proposed to take its 
place. The urgent need of an increase in 
transportation facilities, and the unique con- 
ditions existing in Greater New York, justify 
the creation of a separate board to deal with 
the entire matter of transportation in that part 
of the State. 

I recommend that the Board of Rapid 
Transit Commissioners be abolished and that 
a new board be created, to have all the powers 



Public-Service Commissions 99 

now exercised by the Rapid Transit Board, 
and also to have powers with reference to 
operations within the territory of Greater 
New York, — or if deemed advisable, within a 
wider district embracing the adjoining coun- 
ties into which certain lines of the surface 
railroads extend, — similar to the powers which 
I have suggested should be conferred upon the 
new commission for the rest of the State. 
There would thus be included the reeulation 
of gas and electric corporations. Provision 
should be made for the retention, by the Board 
of Estimate and Apportionment of the city, of 
all the powers, including powers of approval, 
which it now enjoys. The commission pro- 
posed for the State generally should have 
jurisdiction over all traffic between points 
within the city of New York (or within the 
district as created) and points elsewhere in 
the State. It is believed that in this manner 
the whole question of transportation, and of 
gas and electric service, in the territory of 
Greater New York can be dealt with in an 
intelligent and efficient manner, and that to the 
fullest extent possible the just requirements 
of that great community may be satisfied. 



II. 

Speech at the Banquet of the Utica Cham- 
ber of Commerce, April i, 1907. 

The importance of providing effective State 
supervision of public-service corporations seems 
to be generally conceded. I shall not recount 
the grievances which have made the subject 
one of paramount public interest. It is suffi- 
cient to say that the people, without animosity 
toward rights of property, but with a just in- 
sistence upon the performance of public obliga- 
tions, demand that the State shall exercise its 
power over its creatures and compel due re- 
gard for the duties which are correlative to the 
privileges it has granted. 

Federal regulation is not a substitute for 
State regulation. Federal powers and State 
powers are exercised in different spheres. 
Congress has complete authority over inter- 
state commerce and the State cannot interfere 
with the exercise of its prerogatives; and it is 
desirable that the Federal authority shall be 
fully exercised until every abuse incident to 



ICX) 



Utica Chamber of Commerce, 1907 loi 

interstate commerce is ended. But however 
broadly interstate commerce may be defined, 
there will remain the problem of transporta- 
tion wholly within the State and of other 
local public service. Over local or domestic 
commerce as distinguished from interstate 
commerce, Congress has no power to exert 
control, and if the citizens of the State are 
to be protected against abuses of corporate 
privileges, in connection with such local or 
domestic commerce, they must look for their 
remedy to the State and to the State alone. 
It has been suggested that it is a grievous 
thing that a railroad corporation, for example, 
should be subjected to the laws of many dif- 
ferent jurisdictions. Undoubtedly annoyances 
may be caused by a variety of laws and regu- 
lations. But so far as interstate commerce is 
concerned the Federal authority is supreme, 
and as to all matters of through transporta- 
tion there is no room for conflict. We may 
be sure that if the act of any State Legislature, 
or the order of any State commission operates 
as a regulation of interstate commerce, it will 
instantly be challenged by the watchful and 
astute representatives of the corporations af- 
fected, the Federal courts will take jurisdiction, 
and the supremacy of the Federal authority 



I02 Charles Evans Hucrhes 



i> 



under the Constitution will be vindicated. It 
is proper of course that the State in the exer- 
cise of its authority should take account of 
wise legislation of Congress. Useful efforts 
may also be made to promote harmony in 
State legislation. And any State that sets a 
hieh standard in its le^rislative scheme of State 
supervision, and in its efficient administration 
of the law, will contribute powerfully toward 
similar action in other jurisdictions and to the 
establishment throughout the country of proper 
administrative standards. But there is no 
reason why the State of New York should fail 
to enact a just law in the interest of its citizens 
because of the action or inaction of other States. 
The first question presented is : Why should 
there be a Railroad or Public-Service Commis- 
sion ? Every power that a corporation has is 
derived from the Legislature which created it. 
The Legislature defines what powers it shall 
exercise and the conditions upon which it shall 
conduct its operations. As a public service 
corporation it is constantly subject to legisla- 
tive control to the end that it may be re- 
quired to perform in a proper manner the 
service it was chartered to render. So that 
every question of rate or fare, of safety appli- 
ance, or of suitable equipment and facilities is 



Utica Chamber of Commerce, 1907 103 

a question primarily for the Legislature, which, 
within constitutional limits, has a rieht to de- 
fine the obligations of the corporation. But 
the questions which thus arise are of extra- 
ordinary number and variety ; they call for 
investigation and for the consideration of a 
multitude of details. Special conditions must 
be examined and suitable flexibility of action 
must be provided. To-day the Legislatures of 
our States are flooded with special bills aimed 
at this or that grievance in management. But 
the Legislatures sit only a portion of the year 
and cannot deal with these matters satisfac- 
torily. Experience has shown the advisability 
of creating a subordinate body or commission 
with appropriate powers for this purpose. 

Now what is the function of such a com- 
mission ? It is an administrative board. The 
object of its creation is to secure the perform- 
ance of public obligation. The Legislature 
may, within Its constitutional powers, establish 
standards of service. A railroad corporation, 
for example, is bound to give safe, impar- 
tial, and adequate service for a reasonable 
charge. It is the function of the commis- 
sion to secure safety, impartiality, adequacy 
of service, and reasonable charges — that is, 
compliance with the requirements of the law. 



I04 Charles Evans Hughes 

For this purpose it should have full power to 
conduct investigations and to make whatever 
orders in relation to operation that may be 
necessary to secure proper service upon fair 
terms and without unlawful discriminations. 
Undoubtedly very broad powers are required, 
reaching the various departments of manage- 
ment. But it should be remembered they are 
designed to secure the safety and convenience 
of the public. It is no answer to say that 
these powers may be abused. Every officer 
of government who has power adequate for 
any purpose may abuse his power. The safe- 
guard is found in official responsibility and 
accountability. But the possibility of abuse is 
no reason why powers which, in their proper 
exercise are needed for the protection of the 
public, should not be conferred. 

It has been urged that the granting of such 
broad powers is incompatible with the main- 
tenance of the freedom of management said to 
be incident to the property rights of the cor- 
porations. Such an objection has a certain 
plausibility, but will not stand critical examina- 
tion. The Legislature in safeguarding the 
public interest has the power to require such 
equipment and facilities, and such manner of 
operation, as will secure good service. It will 



Utica Chamber of Commerce, 1907 105 

hardly be claimed that the existence of this 
power is inconsistent with property rights. 
The property of a public-service corporation 
has been acquired subject to this power. And 
the power conferred upon the commission is 
conferred for the purpose of securing the per- 
formance of obliofations to which the ricjht of 
property is subordinate. 

Another question is : What is the relation 
of the courts to such a commission ? As has 
been said, the commission is an administrative 
body. It would not be proper for the Legis- 
lature to confer these powers upon the Appel- 
late Division of the Supreme Court. It is not 
in accordance with the theory of our govern- 
ment that an attempt should be made to con- 
vert the court into an administrative board. 
It is not the proper function of the courts to 
fix rates or to make orders as to the facilities 
which should be supplied, or the safety ap- 
pliances which should be used. This is the 
function of the Legislature or of the adminis- 
trative board which it may create to aid in 
securing the performance of the duties it has 
imposed. It would be most unfortunate if, 
with the necessary extension of State super- 
vision of public service, our courts should have 
cast upon them such burdens of administration. 



io6 Charles Evans Huehes 



&' 



The power of the Legislature and of the 
commission it creates is not, however, without 
limits. And where the Legislature croes be- 
yond its constitutional powers, or where the 
administrative board exceeds its authority or 
passes its constitutional limits, the matter falls 
within the jurisdiction of the courts, who will 
declare such action null and void and prevent 
any attempt to enforce the provisions of the 
obnoxious statute or order. 

Both the State and Federal Constitutions 
prohibit the depriving of any person of prop- 
erty without due process of law, and the taking 
of private property for public use without just 
compensation. Nor can a State deny to any 
person within its jurisdiction the equal pro- 
tection of the laws. Neither the Les^islature 
nor the commission can escape these salutary 
checks upon their authority. So that if it be 
claimed that the action of the Legislature or 
of a commission in fixing a rate operates as 
such a deprivation of property, a judicial ques- 
tion is presented, and the courts will take 
jurisdiction and determine that question. They 
will determine it in the light of all the circum- 
stances, seeking to ascertain whether the Legis- 
lature or the commission has exceeded that 
power which the Legislature may properly 



Utica Chamber of Commerce, 1907 107 

exercise in its discretion, or which it may prop- 
erly confer upon an administrative board, or 
whether under the o-uise of reg-ulation there 
has been confiscation. So, if the claim is 
made that the action of the Legislature or 
the commission in professing to provide for 
safe and adequate service lies outside the field 
of legislation in defence of the public interest, 
or of administrative power under legislative 
authority, the claim presents a matter for judi- 
cial consideration, and if the courts find it to 
be sustained they will invalidate the statute or 
order assailed. 

It thus appears that there is of necessity a 
court review where such questions are pre- 
sented. And the distinction between the 
function of the courts and the function of the 
Legislature or of the commission it creates is 
clearly indicated by the fact that the question 
for the courts is whether under the Constitu- 
tion the matter under consideration is one 
that falls within the scope of the authority of 
the Legislature or of the administrative board. 
If the courts decide that it falls within the 
limits of that authority they decline to in- 
terfere ; if they decide that It does not, they 
declare the statute or order void. 

This court review the Legislature cannot 



* J 

1 08 Charles Evans Hughes ^i 

curtail. The courts proceed by virtue of their 
inherent powers under the Constitution. It is 
idle to attempt, and no good citizen desires 
to attempt, to fetter their action. Frequently 
the courts have set aside rates established by 
Legislatures and commissions, and they do not 
hesitate to grant an injunction prohibiting the 
enforcement of the rate pending the suit. 

Property rights are thus abundantly safe- 
guarded, and it is futile to claim that either 
through the establishment of the commission 
or through the exercise of its broad powers 
the invasion of any property right will be 
threatened without adequate redress. 

A different question is presented when it is 
urored that a// orders of the commission should 
be reviewable by the courts regardless of the 
question whether the commission has exceeded 
its authority or any constitutional privilege has 
been ignored. There is no occasion for such a 
broad provision for court review unless it is 
desired to commit to the courts those matters 
which do not involve the question of depriva- 
tion of property without due process of law 
or without just compensation, but are matters 
which might appropriately be decided by the 
Legislature or by an administrative commis- 
sion. To provide a right of appeal to the 



Utica Chamber of Commerce, 1907 109 

courts from every order of the commission 
not only invites delay and an unnecessary mul- 
tiplicity of proceedings, but has for its object 
the substitution of the judgment of the court 
for the action of the commission. To give 
the court power to hear such appeals, to take 
evidence, and to reverse or to modify the 
orders of the commission comes simply to 
this : that the court becomes in effect the rul- 
ine commission, and the commission created 
by the Legislature is simply a board to take 
evidence and make what are, in effect, recom- 
mendations. It may be said that the corpora- 
tions would not necessarily avail themselves 
of the riofht of review in all cases. But it is 
not sound public policy for the Legislature to 
create a board whose effectiveness will depend 
on the option of the corporations. 

The delays that are incident to proceedings 
attackinof the action of the commission as un- 
constitutional are inevitable. But there is no 
good reason why delays should be multiplied 
by allowing court review in all cases. There 
is a broad field of supervision which admittedly 
lies within constitutional authority, and in this 
field it is of the greatest public importance 
that the commission within its own proper 
province should act with reasonable despatch, 



no Charles Evans Hughes 

that its orders should be promptly obeyed, and 
that the public patience should not be vexed 
by dilatory proceedings. 

It is vital to the interests of the community 
that in dealing with these matters we should 
deal both justly and effectively. Merely be- 
cause there are questions which, as we have 
seen, must inevitably be passed upon by the 
courts, we should not run the risk of making 
the scheme of State supervision abortive by 
committins: to the courts the decision of other 
matters with which properly they have no con- 
cern. Proper regulation of corporations is a 
matter so important and the attitude of the 
public toward our public-service operations 
presents so serious a question that we should 
provide the most efficient means of regulation 
that is consistent with the constitutional powers 
of the Leofislature. 

Let us understand that no fundamental 
right of the corporations can be taken away ; 
that the corporations commanding the best 
talent of the country, well advised as to their 
legal rights and equipped with the most per- 
fect machinery for the presentation of their 
claims, will not suffer any deprivation of 
their just rights of property. These will be 
protected by the Constitution and the courts. 



Utica Chamber of Commerce, 1907 m 

If they entertain any serious fear of effective 
regulation, it is not that they will be deprived 
of what rightfully belongs to them. 

What is needed is a commission of dignity, 
of force, of ability ; representing the best 
intelligence of the State available for the pur- 
pose and proceeding in a responsible man- 
ner. It should have such an equipment and 
such technical assistance as will enable it to 
deal with the matters before it thoroughly and 
expertly. With the highest respect for the 
courts, I believe that such a commission can 
best deal with the matters which properly fall 
within its province, and we may be sure, as 
has already been stated, that in cases where 
any doubt can exist as to whether there is an 
invasion of property rights or whether the 
matter does not lie within the province of the 
commission, the courts will be called upon 
to exercise their admitted jurisdiction. 

There are many other phases of the subject 
to which I should be orlad to call attention. 
The power to issue stock and bonds and to 
invest in the securities of other corporations is 
a power derived from the Legislature and sub- 
ject to such conditions as it may impose. No 
consolidation or mero^er of interests can take 
place except pursuant to legislative authority. 



112 Charles Evans Hughes 

Evils that have resulted from an abuse of the 
freedom which has been enjoyed under our cor- 
porate laws are patent to all. It is not simply or 
primarily the question of protection to the in- 
vestor. The paramount demand is that through 
the improper issue of securities there shall not 
be provided a motive for crippling the public 
service or a basis for demanding extortionate re- 
turns. The power of the State should be exer- 
cised to compel respect for the public interest. 

I cannot at this time discuss these questions 
or other matters, such as the selection and 
removal of commissioners, which are involved 
in the proposed scheme of regulation. As I 
have said, these questions are of grave public 
consequence. There is no greater mistake 
than to suppose that the will of the people can 
be permanently disregarded, and it is the duty 
of patriotism to provide for the just expres- 
sion of that will and to remove the causes of 
unrest which lie in abuses of public privilege. 
And in attempting to provide remedies for the 
correction of known evils, let them be real 
remedies, not mere makeshifts which will 
brine the law and its administrators into con- 
tempt, but effective measures which in their 
just operation will promote our tranquillity and 
enhance respect for law and order. 



III. 

speech at the Glens Falls Club, 
April 5, 1907, 

As citizens you are all interested in having 
the government well administered. On this 
question there is no division along party lines. 
The people appreciate the importance of in- 
sisting upon efficiency and of improving the 
standards of administration. They are willing 
to give generous support to those who stand 
for their interests, and they will not fail to call 
strictly to account those who seek, on one 
pretext or another, to block efforts to accom- 
plish this result. They are also — aside from 
the relatively few whose personal interests and 
ambitions are involved — practically united in 
the demand that the powers of government 
shall not be prostituted to selfish ends, and 
that public privilege, under public control, 
shall be exercised for public benefit. 

Those who desire to insure the stability of 
honorable business enterprise, those who de- 
sire to maintain an orderly society, secure 
8 113 



114 Charles Evans Hughes 

against the success of insincere and inflamma- 
tory appeal, those who desire to maintain our 
institutions with their guaranties of equality 
before the law and with their blessincrs of 
opportunity, realize that the time has come 
when the State must assert its power firmly 
and justly in putting an end to existing abuses 
both in the administration of government and 
in the management of those concerns which 
derive their vitality from public franchises. 
Those who oppose this just sentiment chant 
their own requiem. 

The paramount need in the administration 
of the orovernment of this State is to make it 
a more largely responsible government. The 
effort should be to fix responsibility so that 
accountability to the people cannot be escaped. 
Some assert that for this purpose all adminis- 
trative heads of departments and members of 
administrative commissions should be elected. 
I do not assent to this proposition. I believe 
that on the one hand it is destructive of neces- 
sary unity in administration, and on the other 
increases the opportunities for manipulation 
and intrigue. Experience shows that in a poli- 
tical campaign it is difficult to concentrate the 
attention of the people upon a large number 
of offices. The election of all administrative 



Glens Falls Club, April 5, 1907 115 

heads and members of commissions would 
tend, in my judgment, greatly to increase the 
difficulty of securing responsible government. 

On the other hand, the people take a deep 
interest in the selection of the Chief Execu- 
tive. In connection with this office, public 
opinion to the largest degree asserts itself 
with reference to the selection of candidates. 
A system which fixes upon the Governor 
responsibility for the administration of the 
government and clothes him with corre- 
sponding power, is the system which in the 
long run will insure to the people the best 
administration. 

The Constitution provides that the execu- 
tive power shall be vested in the Governor, 
who " shall take care that the laws are faith- 
fully executed." In the popular imagination 
the office is invested with those powers which 
the people instinctively associate with the first 
office in the State. But in reality, while the 
administrative powers and responsibilities of 
the Federal Executive have increased, those 
of the State Executive have diminished. This 
is a mistaken State policy. As Governor 
Hoffman said : 

" To bestow on the Governor of this State the power 
necessary to enforce the laws of the State and on the 



ii6 Charles Evans Huijhes 



£5^ 



Mayor of tlie city all necessary executive power in the 
administration of the affairs in the city, that is concentra- 
tion of power in the proper hands ; power adequate to 
the duties and responsibilities imposed. Without this 
concentration there is no real responsibility ; without it 
we cannot justly hold the Chief Executive accountable 
for his due administration of the government ; we fail 
to enjoy what the English-speaking race prides itself 
upon — responsible government." 

We have now an anomalous condition. In 
the Constitution the people in regard to several 
important offices, have given to the Governor 
appropriate power. Thus it is provided that 
the Superintendent of Public Works shall be 
appointed by the Governor by and with the 
advice and consent of the Senate. But he 
"may be suspended and removed from office 
by the Governor whenever in his judgment 
the public interest shall so require." The 
Superintendent of State Prisons is to be simi- 
larly appointed ; but the Governor " may re- 
move the superintendent for cause at any time, 
giving to him a copy of the charges against 
him and an opportunity to be heard in his de- 
fence." The members of the State Board of 
Charities, and of the State Commission in 
Lunacy are similarly appointed by the Gov- 
ernor with the advice and consent of the 
Senate ; but any member " may be removed 



Glens Falls Club, April 5, 1907 117 

from office by the Governor for cause, an op- 
portunity having been given him to be heard 
in his defence." 

The Constitution also gives the Governor 
power to remove important elective officers. 
Thus sheriffs, clerks of counties, district at- 
torneys, and registers of counties are remov- 
able by the Governor, subject to the provision 
that the officer shall receive a copy of the 
charges against him and an opportunity of be- 
ing heard. Statutes have also conferred upon 
the Governor the power to remove other im- 
portant elective officers. Thus by the Greater 
New York charter the Governor may remove 
the Mayor of New York upon charges, and he 
may remove the Police Commissioner of that 
city whenever, in his judgment, " the public 
interest shall so require." 

But in connection with the important admin- 
istrative offices created by the Legislature, the 
Governor's power of removal has been fettered. 
So that, while in public opinion he is charge- 
able with the administration of the govern- 
ment, he has not the power of removal, through 
the rieht to exercise which correct adminis- 
tration may be secured. For example, the 
Superintendent of Banks, the Superintendent 
of Insurance, and members of the Railroad 



ii8 Charles Evans Hu^-hes 



& 



Commission are removable only by the Senate 
upon the recommendation of the Governor. 
Now it is not sound policy to create administra- 
tive positions which are " under cover " so as to 
speak, without appropriate means for enforcing 
accountability. If these offices are not to be 
elective then those that hold them should 
be directly responsible to the Executive, who 
must account to the people. There should be 
no distribution of responsibility between the 
Executive and the Senate. As a recent writer 
has said: 

" It frequently happens that the law organizing the com- 
mission is so expressed as to give the Governor, after 
making the appointment of its members, no further con- 
trol over the actions of that body. The power of re- 
moval either is denied him, or is hedged about in such a 
way as to make its exercise practically impossible except 
for the grossest malfeasance. . . . After appoint- 
ment by the Governor, they are launched in their orbit 
with practically no one to restrain or limit their action 
within the law. The Governor's reputation may suffer 
by their action, yet, as he has practically no power of 
removal, he is helpless except so far as he may direct 
public attention to the wrongdoing." 

In effect, as has been said, "the commission 
system establishes a fourth department of 
government" without suitable responsibility. 
This matter has particular importance in 



Glens Falls Club, April 5, 1907 119 

connection with the proposal to reorganize the 
system of State supervision of public-service 
corporations. In the bill now pending before 
the Legislature, the power of removal of the 
members of these commissions is lodged with 
the Governor. This has been strongly attacked 
upon the ground that it gives the Governor 
too much power. It is insisted that the power 
of removal should be lodged with the Senate. 

Now, so far as I am personally concerned, 
the matter is not of grave consequence. It is 
very unlikely that I should have occasion to 
remove an officer whom I had nominated, and 
whose qualifications I had had an opportunity 
carefully to examine before the nomination 
was made. I may therefore refer to the mat- 
ter in an impersonal way, and simply for the 
purpose of stating my view as to correct 
political principle. 

The vesting of the power of removal in the 
Governor is objected to on several grounds. 
First it is said that men of self-respect would 
not take the office on such terms. This is 
absurd. No one yet has declined the office 
of Mayor of New York or of Police Commis- 
sioner, or of Sheriff, District Attorney, or 
Superintendent of Public Works because the 
Governor has the power of removal. The 



I20 Charles Evans Hughes 

President has a broad power to remove ad- 
ministrative officers and this has not interfered 
in his calUnor to his aid the best talent in the 
land. Any Interstate Commerce Commis- 
sioner may be removed by the President for 
inefficiency, neglect of duty, or malfeasance in 
office. 

It is also said that if the Senate confirms the 
appointment its concurrence in the removal 
should be required. Neither in logic nor in 
precedent is there a satisfactory basis for 
such a claim. Where the people have spoken 
through the Constitution they have made the 
Superintendent of Public Works, the Superin- 
tendent of Prisons, the members of the State 
Board of Charities and of the Lunacy Com- 
mission removable by the Governor alone, 
although the appointment is with the advice 
and consent of the Senate. 

But the objection that is most seriously 
urged is, that it increases the political power 
of the Governor, and that this may be used 
for political purposes. I believe that to fix 
the responsibility with the Governor, thus 
making him directly accountable to the people 
for the administration of important depart- 
ments, will do much to free administrative 
offices from improper political control, and 



Glens Falls Club, April 5, 1907 121 

will create a powerful incentive toward efficient 
administration. 

The point is that the Governor cannot 
escape accounting to the people for the mis- 
use of his power. His term of office is only- 
two years. The broader his powers, the more 
careful the people will be in his selection. To 
the public mind he is, or should be, responsi- 
ble for administration, and it is not wholesome 
that he should be induced to attempt to ac- 
complish results by indirection. Undoubtedly 
an unscrupulous Governor may abuse his 
powers. As the case stands at present an 
unscrupulous Governor may use unscrupulous 
means to attain the object of his ambition. 
The statutes intended to restrain, operate but 
slightly to the disadvantage of those who are 
impelled by bad motives. The situation now 
is, that an unscrupulous Governor may attain 
his end by a misuse of power, while a scru- 
pulous Governor is blocked in his efforts to 
achieve results. It is a great mistake to be so 
intent on preventing bad administration as 
to make difficult a good one. It is also a 
mistake to distrust the people. 

The true remedy, as I have said, is to unify 
administration, to concentrate administrative 
power, and thus sharply define administrative 



12 2 Charles Evans Hughes 

responsibility. Those who have studied the 
problems of municipal administration are 
practically unanimous with reference to the 
importance of this policy. It is equally im- 
portant in connection with State administra- 
tion. In this way only can proper correctives 
be supplied for administrative abuses. 

This is the more important as the activities 
of the State increase. If we are to protect our 
administrative wards and departments from 
improper influences, if we are to secure admin- 
istration for the benefit of the people without 
favoritism, we must see to it that administra- 
tive offices are not created which are practi- 
cally immune from accountability, and that the 
people, through officers of their choice, are 
able to express their will. 

In this country, with its constitutional safe- 
guards, the interests of property will not be 
endangered. This is the people's country ; 
they have established constitutional limits 
within which administrative powers must be 
exercised. They are entitled to have these 
powers exercised in a responsible manner. 
And they will run no serious risk if the powers 
essential to secure faithful performance of 
administrative duty are centred in the Chief 
Executive of their choice. 



Glens Falls Club, April 5, 1907 123 

I may say a word in regard to another mat- 
ter affecting the pending legislation. It has 
been pretended by some that it interferes with 
the freedom of employees to work or not to 
work as they choose. Such a contention is 
absurd. No commission, under this law or 
any other law, would have the right to compel 
men to work against their will. This is a free 
country, and, under our Constitution, slavery 
and involuntary servitude are impossible. A 
law which undertook to compel men to work 
for a corporation who did not wish to work for 
that corporation would not be worth the paper 
that it was written on, and no one can find 
any such intention within the four corners of 
the proposed law. 

It has also been said that the bill legalizes 
mergers which have already, taken place. It 
does nothinof of the sort. Past transactions 
are either lawful or unlawful. If they were 
lawful, it is important that the new legislation 
should not be construed as intended to affect 
any right which is safeguarded by the Con- 
stitution. If they were unlawful, the proposed 
bill does not legalize them. The provision of 
the bill simply is that it shall not affect what 
has been lawfully done, and every right which 
exists, with every reference to any illegal 



124 Charles Evans Hus^hes 



transaction in the past, will continue to exist 
without impairment by anything in the pro- 
posed law. 

Something has also been said regarding the 
penalties provided for by the law, but it will 
be noticed that the penalties stated are merely 
maximum penalties. There is no provision 
in the bill, for example, that a corporation vio- 
lating the act shall be mulcted in a penalty of 
$5000 for every day that the violation con- 
tinues. The penalty is a sum not to exceed 
$5000 for each offence or for each day's con- 
tinuance. The penalty is not required to be a 
particular sum, but within the limit stated will 
be fixed at such sum as the court may find 
just in view of all the circumstances of the 
case. If the company ought to pay $5000 a 
day, it will have to pay that sum. If this would 
be unjust and result in the extreme penalties 
described by the opponents of the bill, a sum 
will be fixed that is both adequate and just. 
The court has the necessary latitude so that 
proper punishment may be meted out. Nor is 
any one in danger of a penalty unless he vio- 
lates the law. And of course there will be no 
penalty at all unless the order is valid and 
should be obeyed. 

As I have said before, the law in its operation 



Glens Falls Club, April 5, 1907 125 

should not be unfair or oppressive, but it 
should be effectual. 

Property rights are not threatened, freedom 
of management consistent with just recognition 
of public obligations is not interfered with. I 
need not repeat what I have recently said in 
regard to the proper function of the courts 
and the importance of avoiding dilatory pro- 
ceedings to secure a court review of matters 
which are purely administrative. 

Let me say in conclusion that I believe 
there is general recognition of the importance 
of providing for suitable State supervision of 
public-service corporations as is now proposed ; 
that I believe the people of this State indorse 
the effort to place an adequate measure of 
relief upon the statute books ; and I believe 
that a majority of the members of the Legis- 
lature are alive to the importance of the ques- 
tion presented and will be found to be in accord 
with the public sentiment upon this question. 



IV. 

speech at the Banquet of the Buffalo 
Chamber of Commerce, April i8, 1907, 

We have met to-night to commemorate 
commercial enterprise and industrial achieve- 
ment. You unroll the record of the successes 
of fifty years to find inspiration and promise 
for the future. And in the building you have 
set apart to-day for your Chamber of Com- 
merce you have at once a monument and a 
prophecy. The half century that has passed 
since your organization has witnessed the 
development, of the national consciousness 
which has rendered the Union secure against 
dismemberment, and has prepared the way 
for the realization, upon the largest scale the 
world has ever known, of the ideals of dem- 
ocracy and of the blessings which through 
equality of opportunity under a free govern- 
ment may come to a united and industri- 
ous people. 

For government — and free o-overnment — is 

not an end but a means. And its object is to 

126 



Buffalo Chamber of Commerce, 1907 127 

secure the broadest diffusion of prosperity and 
the widest scope of individual opportunity con- 
sistent with the welfare of all. 

We sometimes hear voiced a feeling of re- 
sentment against the assertion of public rights 
upon the ground that it is an attack upon the 
business interests of the country. A sullen 
and defiant attitude toward public opinion ill 
becomes an American citizen. Both unprin- 
cipled attempts to corrupt it and despotic 
efforts to defy it must, in this land of sound 
common-sense, inevitably fail. 

One of the dangers of the rapidity of our 
development is overstrain. Brain and nerve 
have never been subjected to such tests as are 
now imposed upon those who are charged with 
the responsibilities of success, either in com- 
mercial, industrial, or professional life. A 
railroad man told me the other day that for 
the purpose of securing necessary assistants in 
the enlargement of his railroad facilities he had 
sent to one of the largest railroad corporations 
in the country for a list of available men. He 
had received the names of a considerable num- 
ber between thirty-five and forty-five years of 
age, among whom he recognized many who 
had won distinction for their abilities, and 
against all was the note "broken down." That 



128 Charles Evans Hughes 



fe' 



I suppose was the reason why they were 
"available." 

Now in a situation like this, where executive 
ability is crowded to the utmost, and the de- 
mands of the day are multiplied, while the 
hours of the day remain inexorably fixed, there 
is danger of an undue tenseness and of a 
tendency to disorganization. If I were to put 
in a phrase the special demand of the hour 
upon all those engaged in the discussion of 
public and economic questions affecting the 
business interests of the country, I should say: 
Let these questions be upon your conscience 
and upon your heart, but not upon your 



" nerves." 



The prevailing sentiment in this country is 
wholesome and just ; it is idealistic; it rejoices 
in the extension of commerce and the develop- 
ment of industry ; it takes pride in the ability 
that invents, in the talent that can organize 
effort and make co-operation productive ; it 
honors honest toil of hand or brain ; it prizes 
sagacity and thrift; it extols prudence ; it rev- 
erences achievement. But it also demands 
honesty. It also exacts fidelity, both to private 
and to public obligation. It believes in free- 
dom of opportunity, not that a few may exploit 
the many, but that each, working according to 



Buffalo Chamber of Commerce, 1907 129 

his talent, may receive a just return, and that 
the rights of all in their community relations 
shall be paramount to the selfish interest of 
any one. 

The people draw a clear distinction between 
the builders and the destroyers of our Com- 
monwealth. Work is honorable and no true 
American begrudges the workman his well- 
earned reward. For the rank and file who are 
toiling to develop the resources of our country 
and to facilitate the exchanges of commerce ; 
for the great army of workers in their varied 
fields of effort who are giving their lives to 
industry and making possible our commercial 
development, the people have naught but 
praise. They are not against business, but 
against abuses ; and to preserve the interests 
of the former the latter must be stopped. 

Who are the enemies of the Republic? 
They are not those who are doing an honest 
day's work and who seek to do their work 
under fair and decent conditions. 

They are not those who manage industry 
and commerce with just regard for those who 
are under their direction and with proper 
recognition of public rights. 

They are not those who, husbanding the 
resources they have lawfully acquired, seek to 



130 Charles Evans Hughes 

enlarge the field of enterprise and to afford 
opportunity for new and useful employments. 

They are not those who, taking account of 
the evils that afflict society, attempt to provide 
adequate remedies. 

There are two classes of enemies to the 
prosperity of this country. 

The first consists of the unscrupulous who 
have no sympathy with democratic ideals, and 
who, by their abuse of the privileges obtained 
from the State and their cynical indifference 
to public obligations, bring law and govern- 
ment into contempt. 

The second class consists of those who seek 
profit in unprincipled agitation. 

The second thrives upon the evils created 
by the first. 

Now the great progress of the country, so 
strikingly exemplified in this favored city, 
must give us pause. Business and commerce 
must have stability, but they cannot find it 
unless the public confidence is maintained. 
This means efficient government and adequate 
public regulation of public service. There is 
no measure more truly conservative than that 
which commands the pubHc respect, as con- 
serving the public interest. Favoritism in 
public service is an iniquity that the people 



Buffalo Chamber of Commerce, 1907 131 

will not and should not tolerate ; it is an evil 
which the business men of the country are 
determined to end. The public are entitled 
to be assured that the business which is con- 
ducted by virtue of the franchises they grant, 
is conducted as the public interest requires. 
They desire extensions of facilities ; they wish 
to encourage betterments ; they have no in- 
clination to hamper industry ; but they are 
tired of financial jugglery, and they demand 
proper service. There is no reason why those 
who are endeavoring to meet fairly public 
obligations should suffer by the improper 
practices of others engaged in the same busi- 
ness. The remedy is to provide such regula- 
tion of public service as will assure the people 
that provision has been made for the investiga- 
tion of every question and that each matter 
will be decided according to its merits in the 
light of day. 

But equally important is it to insist upon 
the maintenance of the highest standards of 
administration in government and not to tol- 
erate any prostitution of public office to selfish 
purposes. Now I have confidence in the peo- 
ple. And I have no confidence in those make- 
shifts which result from distrust of the people. 
But whether you have confidence or not in 



132 Charles Evans Hughes 

popular judgment, let me assure you that in 
this country it is idle to inveigh against it. 
You must abide by it. And the security 
of business is in the provision of adequate 
means for responsible government, in holding 
officials strictly to account for their perform- 
ance of duty, and in a compliance on the 
part of those in charge of our great business 
enterprises with the obvious demands of 
justice. 



V. 

Speech before the Elmira Chamber of 
Commerce, May 3, 1907.* 

I did not come here to-night to join in a de- 
bate. It is entirely true that I had purposed 
to say some things in regard to the very meas- 
ure about which my friend Mr. Stanchfield has 
spoken, and I shall not say any less, but per- 
haps something more. In distinction from my 
learned friend, I am here under a retainer. I 
am here retained by the people of the State of 
New York, to see that justice is done, and 
with no disposition to injure any investment, 
but with every desire to give the fullest oppor- 
tunity to enterprise, and with every purpose 
to shield and protect every just property in- 
terest. I stand for the people of the State of 
New York against extortion, against favoritism, 

* Governor Hughes had prepared a speech for this occasion but 
Mr. John B. Stanchfield, who spoke before he did, made an attack 
upon the Public-Service Commissions bill, saying as he did so that 
he was "under no retainer from the railroads," and the Governor 
abandoned his prepared speech to make an extemporaneous reply to 
Mr. Stanchfield's arguments. 

133 



134 Charles Evans Hughes 

against financial scandal, and against every- 
thing that goes to corrupt our politics by 
interference with the freedom of our Legis- 
lature and administration. I stand for honest 
government and effective regulation by the 
State of public-service corporations. 

Now, I am fully conscious, as is every one 
who professes to have a modicum of intelli- 
gence, of the tremendous advantages which 
the country and every community in it have 
derived from the extension of our railroad 
facilities. Our communities would be life- 
less, our trade would collapse, we would all be 
worse than dead, were it not for these oppor- 
tunities of communication and these facilities 
of transportation. We honor every just ef- 
fort to make these possible. We want every 
opportunity afforded to enable the people to 
move their produce, and we want fair treat- 
ment to those who are engaged in this very 
necessary activity. Yet it is said that, despite 
the prosperity of the country and the great 
benefits that have been derived from the 
extension of our transportation facilities, 
there is a state of unrest ; that there is a 
general condition of discontent throughout the 
country. Why ? Is it because of extension 
of means of communication ? Will any one 



Elmira Chamber of Commerce, 1907 135 

sueofest to an intellicrent audience that Ameri- 
can citizens are in revok against their own 
prosperity ? What they revoh against is dis- 
honest finance. What they are in rebehion 
aofainst is favoritism which orives a chance to 
one man to move his goods and not to another ; 
which gives to one man one set of terms and 
another set to his rival ; which makes one man 
rich and drives another man into bankruptcy 
or into combination with his more successful 
competitor. It is a revolt against all the in- 
fluences which have grown out of an unlicensed 
freedom, and of a failure to recognize that 
these great privileges, so necessary for public 
welfare, have been created by the public for 
the public benefit and not primarily for private 
advantage. 

There has been a determined effort througrh 
the State to make it appear that the Chambers 
of Commerce in New York and the business 
men composing those Chambers of Commerce 
are opposed to an efi^ective scheme of State 
regulation of public-service corporations and 
opposed to the specific measure now pending 
in the Legislature having that object in view. 

I do not believe that the resolutions that 
have been passed reflect the sentiment of the 
business men of the State of New York. It 



136 Charles Evans Hughes 

would be most unfortunate were it so. There 
are undoubtedly many whose interests are 
directly affected, and who desire to maintain 
existing conditions and to enjoy unrestricted 
freedom in order that they may give rein to 
their own selfish purposes, who undoubtedly 
are frankly and consistently against the propo- 
sition. There are others who throw a sop 
to public opinion by saying that they believe 
in reo^ulation and who then will contest with 
you any provision that promises effective 
regulation. 

I heard a distinguished railway man the 
other night speak of the great difficulties 
under which railroads are now suffering, en- 
deavoring to keep up with the extraordinary 
demands that are Incident to our very rapid 
improvement and development in commerce. 
I sympathize with those difficulties. I sympa- 
thize with the operating man who lies awake 
nights trying to devise means by which he can 
improve traffic facilities. I sympathize with 
the great army of active railroad men who, 
under severe conditions, are trying to perform 
their duty. There is nothing antagonistic to 
them, or to anybody who desires to deal 
squarely with the public, within the four 
corners of that bill. This orentleman said. 



Elmira Chamber of Commerce, 1907 137 

speaking for the raihoads : " We want friendly 
co-operation ; we want protection against ag- 
gression and injustice." And I speak for the 
people by saying : " So do w^e." That is 
what we want on both sides — friendly co- 
operation for just ends and protection against 
aggression and injustice. 

I am amused at times at the phantoms that 
are conjured up by practical men whose ex- 
perience should have taught them better. It 
is said that a commission with such broad 
powers would take active management of rail- 
road corporations and practically oust their 
boards of directors. Imagine the situation of 
any such commission taking into consider- 
ation the vast variety of questions relating 
to the management of any one railroad cor- 
poration. Think of the great number of prob- 
lems and complaints necessarily committed 
to any such commission, and then tell an 
intelligent American audience that any such 
commission could, if it wanted to, manage any 
railroad ! 

But what is important and vital to any 
scheme of regulation is this : That wherever 
there is an abuse the commission can put its 
fino-er on it and hear the evidence and deter- 
mine whether or not the abuse exists, and if 



138 Charles Evans Hughes 

it does exist stop it, no matter in what depart- 
ment of management it may be. Why, you 
cannot do that unless you give power which 
in an emergency will reach any department of 
manaofement, so that wherever an evil exists 
which the State ought to control and correct, 
the power delegated by the State to such 
a body can be exercised for its correction. 
That does not mean that any commission 
should displace the operating management of 
any particular property. It does mean that 
they should have the power to exercise con- 
trol sufficient to correct abuses that might 
exist. Now, when we consider these matters 
in detail, you will find, and I have found, the 
railroad men sitting quietly down with you 
and talking it over. You take up one thing 
after another and they will say : " Yes, they 
ought to have power to do so." Suppose so 
and so ? Yes, they ought to have power to 
do it, assuming that they start with the prem- 
ise that the business of the public-service cor- 
poration is a public business. There are many 
who lay down that premise very glibly, never 
to remember it again ; and who, having admit- 
ted to you that the management of the rail- 
road is public business, forthwith will argue 
with you that it is their own private concern. 



Elmira Chamber of Commerce, 1907 139 

But when you deal with a ralhoad man who 
fairly and squarely meets you, you will find 
that he will agree that these powers are needed, 
supposing that abuses exist which would call 
them into action. The other night I was talk- 
ing to such a gentleman, and when we got 
through, the practical result of all was this : 
I said to him : " What you really want is 
a chance to go to the courts ? " And he said : 
"Yes, that is all there is about it." That 
seemed to be the main point. A chance to go 
from the commission to the courts. 

I have the highest regard for the courts. 
My whole life has been spent in work con- 
ditioned upon respect for the courts. I reckon 
him one of the worst enemies of the commu- 
nity who will talk lightly of the dignity of the 
bench. We a re under a Constitution, but the 
Constitution is jwhat the judges say it is, and 
the judiciary is the safeguard of our liberty 
and of our property under the Constitution. 
I do not want to see any direct assault upon 
the courts, nor do I want to see any indirect 
assault upon the courts. And I tell you, ladies 
and gentlemen, no more insidious assault could 
be made upon the independence and esteem 
of the judiciary than to burden it with these 
questions of administration, — questions which 



I40 Charles Evans Hughes 

lie close to the public impatience, and in re- 
gard to which the people are going to insist 
on having administration by officers directly 
accountable to them. 

Let us keep the courts for the questions 
they were intended to consider. When ques- 
tions of property rights are involved, — the 
constitutional right to hold property and not 
to be deprived of it without due process of 
law is involved ; when, under the guise of 
regulation or authority to supervise railroad 
management, there is an assumption of arbi- 
trary power not related to public convenience ; 
when there is a real judicial question — let the 
courts have it and every good citizen will 
stand aside and hope to see it decided fairly 
and with even-handed justice. 

When you deal with matters of this sort 
you may be sure that there will be a variety of 
questions, which, whatever the fact may ultim- 
ately be proved to be, can by astute lawyers be 
said to involve such judicial matters, and there 
will be abundant opportunity for review of 
everything that should be reviewed. But to 
say that all these matters of detail which 
will be brouofht before the commission, — mat- 
ters requiring men to give their entire atten- 
tion to the subject, to get their information 



Elmira Chamber of Commerce, 1907 141 

in a variety of ways, to have hearings of 
those interested, and to deal with questions 
from a practical standpoint, — should, at the 
option of the corporations, be taken into 
court, is to make a mockery of your regula- 
tion, And, on the other hand, if that policy 
should succeed, it would swamp your courts 
with administrative burdens and expose them 
to the fire of public criticism in connection 
with matters of this description, from which I 
hope they will be safeguarded. 

You must have administration, and you must 
have administration by administrative ofhcers. 
You cannot afford to have it otherwise. Under 
the proper maintenance of your system of gov- 
ernment and in view of the wide extension of 
reo-ulatine schemes which the future is destined 
to see, you cannot afford to have that ad- 
ministration by your courts. With the courts 
giving a series of decisions in these administra- 
tive matters hostile to what the public believes, 
and free from that direct accounting to which 
administrative officers are subject, you will 
soon find a propaganda advocating a short- 
term judiciary, and you will turn upon our 
courts — the final safeguard of our liberties — 
that hostile and perhaps violent criticism from 
which they should be shielded and will be 



142 Charles Evans Hughes 

shielded if left with tlie jurisdictions which it 
was intended they should exercise. 

Now it seems to be regarded as a very serious 
thing that my successor might remove the com- 
missioners I appoint. I do not share the fears 
of my friend, because the experience of the past 
has taught us that the only safety of democratic 
government is responsible government. If you 
put men in a position where they cannot be 
reached and are not compelled to be account- 
able, you put a premium upon incompetency, 
you put a premium upon political interference 
and set the people at bay. Do you want these 
commissioners elected? Some might say "Yes." 
I say that is not the way to get really responsi- 
ble government, but rather diffused responsi- 
bility ; to prevent unity of administration, to 
break up a S3^stem of accountability which 
would be found to answer the purpose. If you 
apply it in that case, why not through the 
whole administrative field ? Voters would not 
know the quaHfications of the men for whom 
they were voting, and they would have no op- 
portunity to test their qualifications for this 
administrative position or that. There is one 
safety for the voters, and that is to say to 
the man who is elected Governor, just as the 
owner of a business would say to a man he 



Elmira Chamber of Commerce, 1907 14 



puts in control of that business: "You run 
this business and I will hold you accountable 
for it." Pick your man and get the right man, 
and hold him directly accountable to the peo- 
ple. Say to him : " You whom we can watch — 
you with reference to whose selection public 
sentiment in the first instance has the largest 
play under our system, — you run the business 
and we will see how you run it." 

We have had a recent illustration. Eigh- 
teen months ago the whole country, and you 
might say the whole world, was shocked by 
the revelation of corruption *^n those insti- 
tutions which we deemed strongest and which 
we supposed to be officered by the most 
honorable and efficient managers. It was a 
business that constituted a sacred trust, and 
affected the savings and securities of thousands 
of homes throusfhout our State. And when 
it appeared that those who were trusted 
were faithless ; when it appeared that these 
funds had been used for extravagant, corrupt 
purposes, that book-keeping had been decep- 
tive, that vouchers had been improper, that all 
the safeguards which go to maintain proper 
administration had been neglected, — a great 
outcry went up from the people of the State 
and the people of the United States. They 



144 Charles Evans Hughes 

said : " This thing must stop ! " And that was 
in a business under governmental control. 
That was in a business under a control 
designed by statutes which pried into the 
very life of every department of activity. 
It was a State department in the hands of 
those who could walk into offices, take ac- 
counts, examine books, put officers on oath, 
and make reports. It was a business put under 
severe regulations because of its high impor- 
tance, — and these things happened. What 
a farce it all was ! And the people of the 
State knew it. 

When I went into office some eight months 
or so after the laws had been enacted which 
resulted from that investigation, there was 
practically the same condition of affairs that 
had existed in the course of the insurance in- 
vestigation, and the very men through whose 
negligence and connivance all these things had 
taken place were there as the trusted and con- 
fidential advisers of the Superintendent. It 
was an intolerable situation. No business 
manager would have stood it. There was no 
personal question involved. It would have 
been much more agreeable to me to leave it 
alone. But it was there, and it was my duty 
to endeavor to put the department upon the 



Elmira Chamber of Commerce, 1907 145 

best possible basis of efficiency to protect the 
interests of the policyholders, and I sought 
to do it. 

Now, that is an illustration of the situation 
where places are created which are removed 
from any direct accounting. No removability 
except by the Senate means incompetent and 
inefficient administration, and in the long run 
political administration. I do not care who is 
Governor, in the long run the one safeguard 
of the American people is responsible govern- 
ment with power adequate to meet the re- 
sponsibility and accountability to the people 
for the exercise of that power. 

Now we want in these measures, as in other 
measures, to be just ; but we want to be effec- 
tive. We cannot have any power that is not 
susceptible of abuse. There is not a single 
State officer who has power enough to do his 
duty but could be guilty of a serious abuse if 
he neglected his duty. 

In your Mayor and in your Governor, and 
in others entrusted with administrative powers, 
you must repose confidence. And if these 
men really stand, not in some secluded nook, 
protected by some statute passed without due 
regard to the public interest, but directly be- 
fore the bar of public opinion, in the long run 



146 Charles Evans Hughes 

the people will get their due. And my policy 
in this measure, as in every other measure, is 
simply to see to the best of my ability during 
my short term that the people get what they 
are entitled to receive. 



VI. 

Veto of the Two-Cent Fare Bill. 

State of New York — Executive Chamber. 

Albany, June ii, 1907. 

To the Assembly : 

I return herewith, without my approval, 
Assembly Bill No. 2269, entitled, "An Act to 
amend the railroad law, in relation to rates of 
fare." 

This bill, with specified exceptions, provides 
for a maximum passenger fare of two cents 
per mile upon the railroads in this State. 
Steam railroads less than 150 miles in length, 
which are not within the counties of New 
York and Kings (or within the limits of an in- 
corporated city), are permitted a higher maxi- 
mum charge of three, four, and five cents a 
mile according to length of line, unless through 
consolidation, lease, or control they form part 
of a system whose combined lines exceed 
150 miles, in which case the provision for a 
maximum rate of two cents a mile is applicable. 

147 



148 Charles Evans Hughes 

The passage of the bill was not preceded 
by legislative investigation or suitable inquiry 
under the authority of the State. Nor is the 
fixing of this rate predicated on reports or 
statistics officially collated which would permit 
a fair conclusion as to the justice of its opera- 
tion with reference to the railroads within its 
purview. It plainly reflects dissatisfaction 
with existing conditions and an effort to pro- 
vide a remedy through arbitrary action. It 
seems largely to have been the result of an- 
noying requirements and discriminations in 
connection with the sale of mileaofe books 
on certain roads. 

The bill represents a policy seriously mis- 
taken and pregnant with disaster. It is of the 
utmost importance that the management of 
our railroad corporations should be subject 
to strict supervision by the State and that 
regulations compelling the observance of the 
law and proper and adequate service should 
be rigidly enforced. It is the duty of these 
corporations to provide transportation of pas- 
sengers and goods at reasonable rates, and the 
State should compel the performance of this 
obligation. 

But injustice on the part of railroad cor- 
porations toward the public does not justify 



Two-Cent Fare Bill, 1907 149 

injustice on the part of the State toward the 
railroad corporations. The action of govern- 
ment should be fair and impartial, and upon 
this every citizen, whatever his interest, is 
entitled to insist. We shall make matters not 
better but worse if to cure one wrong we 
establish another. The fact that those in con- 
trol of railroad corporations have been guilty 
of grossly improper financiering and of illegal 
and injurious discriminations in charges points 
clearly to the necessity of effective State ac- 
tion, but does not require or warrant arbitrary 
reprisals. In dealing with these questions 
democracy must demonstrate its capacity to 
act upon deliberation and to deal justly. 

It is of the greatest importance not only 
that railroad corporations should be compelled 
to respect their public obligations, but also 
that they should be permitted to operate un- 
der conditions which will give a fair return for 
their service. Upon this depend not simply 
the security of investors, but the security of 
their employees and the protection of every 
form of industry and commerce through the 
maintenance and extension of necessary trans- 
portation facilities. Nothing could be more 
opposed to the interests of the community as 
a whole than to cripple transportation corpora- 



150 Charles Evans Hughes 

tions by arbitrary reduction of earnings. It 
may be said that a two-cent passenger rate is 
not so extreme as to have a very injurious 
result. But this is a debatable question. 
Large and prosperous suburban communities 
have been built up through the offer of com- 
mutation rates much less than the proposed 
maximum. Upon the maintenance of these 
rates many thousands of our citizens rely. 
Considerable differences exist between the 
railroad corporations with respect to the ter- 
ritory they serve and the cost of service, and 
it is manifest that what would be fair for one 
might be far from fair for another. An arbi- 
trary dislocation of tariffs by the fiat of the 
Legislature without investis^ation is a matter 
of serious concern. The best that could be 
said for such legislation would be that it should 
be regarded as an isolated case and not as a 
precedent. For if flat freight rates, either for 
all commodities or for different kinds of com- 
modities, were similarly to be fixed by the 
Legislature without investigation or proper 
ascertainment of their justice, our railroad 
business and our industrial and commercial 
interests would be thrown into confusion. 

I do not mean to be understood as saying 
that a maximum two-cent passenger rate would 



Two-Cent Fare Bill, 1907 151 

be unreasonably low. It might be high enough 
in many cases. Possibly it would be high 
enough in all cases. I fully appreciate the 
fact that those who have promoted this bill 
believe that such a rate would be fair. But I 
deem it most important that the policy of deal- 
ing with matters of this sort arbitrarily, by 
legislative rule of general application without 
reference to the demands of justice in particu- 
lar cases, should be condemned. Every work- 
ingman, every tradesman, and every citizen 
believing himself to have aught at stake in the 
prosperity of the country, should determinedly 
oppose it. For it not only threatens the sta- 
bility of business enterprise which makes our 
prosperity possible, but it substitutes unreason 
for sound judgment, the ill-considered demands 
of resentment for the spirit of fair play, and 
makes impossible patient and honorable effort 
to correct abuses. 

There is a better way. It has already been 
pointed out in the legislation of this State. It 
is practically impossible, in view of the nature 
of the problems and the many questions re- 
quiring consideration, for the Legislature to 
deal directly with railroad rates in a satisfac- 
tory manner. Where a matter requires in- 
vestigation in order that a just result may be 



152 Charles Evans Hughes 

reached, the obvious course is to create a body 
which can investigate, with expert assistance, 
as summarily as possible, and which shall have 
adequate power to make appropriate orders. 
Such a body has been created in this State 
throuo-h the Public-Service Commissions Law 
recently enacted. 

Provision is made for inquiry into matters 
of freight rates and passenger fares, and for 
the fixing of such rates as shall be found just 
and reasonable. If a passenger rate of two 
cents a mile is just and reasonable, it can be 
fixed. If it is not just and reasonable, it 
should not be fixed. 

It will be said that this requires time and 
investigation. But it will not require any 
longer time or any more protracted investiga- 
tion than are necessary to reach a right result. 
The interests of the country are so great 
and our individual interests are so closely 
interwoven that it is to the highest degree 
dangerous to give encouragement to the 
spirit of impatience with the orderly proc- 
esses of inquiry. 

It may also be said that many other States 
have adopted similar legislation. If the prin- 
ciple of that legislation be sound we could 
readily follow the precedent ; but if it be 



Two-Cent Fare Bill, 1907 153 

unsound there is the greater reason why it should 
not be followed. The State of New York has 
provided machinery to settle these questions 
justly to all with as much despatch as possible. 
It is to the interest of all that this machinery 
should be made as perfect and efficient as pos- 
sible. It is to the interest of none that it 
should be discarded because of preference for 
arbitrary legislative action. 

If this bill were to become a law it would 
most probably lead in many cases — on account 
of pretended or real necessity — to economies 
in service and to readjustment of rates now 
lower, to the annoyance and injury of consid- 
erable numbers of the travelling public for 
which the gain to others would not necessarily 
compensate. Again, the validity of such a 
statute would almost certainly be contested in 
protracted litigation, the result of which, to 
say the least, would be in doubt. At a critical 
time, when the interests of all demand that 
reason and judgment should control in dealing 
with such matters, we should have abandoned 
our true line of action and facilitated still 
wider departures. 

I therefore disapprove this bill. 

(Signed) Charles E. Hughes. 



I 



III. 



Occasional Addresses. 



" If in administration we inake the standard efficiency 
and not partisan advantage, if in executing the laws we 
deal impartially, if in making the laws there is fair and 
intelligent action with reference to each exigency, we shall 
disarm reckless and selfish agitators and take from the ene- 
mies of our peace their vantage ground of attack. It is my 
intention to employ my constitutional powers to this end.'' — 
From Governor Hughes's Inaugural Address, January 
I 1907. 



155 



I. 

Speech at the Banquet of the Albany 
Republican Organization, February 
27, 1907. 

We are all interested in the success of the 
Republican party. I have been a Republican 
from the time I came of age. I am grateful 
for the splendid services it has rendered to the 
country and for the memories of the noble men 
under whose leadership in repeated crises the 
party has proved itself equal to the task of 
preserving and administering the government. 
There is no political organization in this coun- 
try which at this time has such an opportunity 
of serving the people by efficient administra- 
tion and by wise constructive effort in the cor- 
rection of known evils. The party has its 
future in its own keeping, and if it will measure 
up to its traditions and meet its opportunities 
it will for many years be invincible both in 
State and Nation. 

I do not condone any public wrong because 

it is committed by a Republican any more than 

157 



158 Charles Evans Hughes 

I would were it committed by a Democrat. 
Nor do I think that loyalty to party requires 
support of anything wrong either in policy 
or in administration which we would feel 
free to condemn if the wrongdoing could 
be ' charged to those of a different political 
faith. No one can convince me that he is a 
loyal Republican, with the interests of the 
party at heart, who will misuse official position 
or will be content with anything short of the 
best service of the people. I count it the high- 
est loyalty to the party to insist that the work 
done under Republican auspices shall be hon- 
estly done and well done, and that our record 
of administration shall not be smirched by 
either corruption or inefficiency. 

Organization is essential to successful effort, 
and no sane man would expect any political 
undertakinof to be successful which is not skil- 
fully organized and wisely managed. But the 
success of political organization, important as 
is practical management, will depend upon its 
ideals. No matter how skilfully constructed 
or astutely led, the people will smash any or- 
ganization that is devoted to selfish interests. 
Give the people the idea that the main purpose 
of organization is to secure control for personal 
advantage or for favored interests, and sooner 



Albany, February 27, 1907 159 

or later they will bring to grief the best-laid 
plans of the most astute leaders. But, on the 
other hand, convince them that organization 
is directed to the purpose of maintaining an 
honorable party policy and of promoting an 
administration of orovernment in the interest 
of the people, and they will rally to its support. 
The lessons of the day to the Republican 
party in this State are not hard to learn. In 
1894, as a rebuke to an organization that 
had overreached itself, Governor Morton was 
elected by over 150,000 majority. This suc- 
ceeded many years of Democratic rule and 
Democratic opportunity. In the last three pre- 
sidential elections the State has oriven remark- 
able pluralities for the Republican candidate. 
McKinley had 268,000 in 1896 and 143,000 
in 1900; and Theodore Roosevelt received 
over 175,000 in 1904. The Republican 
candidate for Governor in these years, while 
having the advantage of the sentiment created 
in favor of the candidates of the national party, 
fell conspicuously behind the national candi- 
date. While McKinley had 268,000 in 1896, 
Governor Black received 212,000. Where 
McKinley had 143,000 in 1900, Governor 
Odell received 111,000. While Mr. Roosevelt 
had 175,000 in 1904, Governor Higgins had 



i6o Charles Evans Hughes 



&' 



80,000. But we have a far more striking 
divergence when we compare the votes cast in 
the intermediate years when there was no presi- 
dential campaign. Thus, while Governor 
Black received 212,000 in 1896, Governor 
Roosevelt was elected in 1898 by a little 
under 18,000. While Governor Odell received 
111,000 in 1900, his plurality in 1902 was 
short of 9000. While Governor Higgins was 
elected by 80,000 in 1904, in the last election 
all the Republican candidates for State offices, 
save one, were defeated. 

The Republican who fails to realize the sig- 
nificance of these figures is paying little atten- 
tion to the demands of the people of the State 
and the relation of these demands to party suc- 
cess. Undoubtedly there were special circum- 
stances in the case of each election. But it is 
clearly evident that on State issues the Re- 
publican party will be doomed to defeat unless 
it gives new assurances to the people of its 
capacity to govern in their interest. 

Now, I do not profess to be versed in the 
wisdom of politics, and I make no claim to 
knowledge of political strategy. But I do 
know this : That if the Republican party 
expects to succeed in this State it must support 
every effort to give efficient administration. 



Albany, February 27, 1907 161 

No man is a friend of the Republican party 
who asks me or any one in authority to ap- 
point a man or to retain a man who is not 
equal to his job. If you want a strong party 
organization, then let it be insisted upon that 
no man can expect the support of the organi- 
zation who does not make s:ood. Make it a 
point of honor to demand the best service for 
the State. Let us devote ourselves to meeting 
the need of the hour by providing just and 
effective measures for the correction of abuses. 
The Republican party has the vantage ground; 
it has the opportunity ; there is no reason why 
it should yield it to its opponents. 

I make no request for personal support. So 
far as I am personally concerned my interests 
lie in a profession to which I would be glad 
to devote myself. But I am desirous that the 
Republican party should take advantage of its 
opportunity to convince the people that it can 
be trusted to meet their demand in furnishinor 
competent administration of every department 
of government, and in the enforcement of the 
laws, and in the enactment of the legislation 
that is required to protect the people against 
the misuse of the privileges they have bestowed. 

For that policy I do desire support. I de- 
sire the support of the Republican organization. 



1 62 Charles Evans Hughes 

I am erateful for the assurances that have been 
received. Let there be a demonstration that 
we are a party of the people and that the 
interest of all citizens is safe in our keeping. 

Let us put an end to graft and to favors to 
special interests. Let organization be skilful 
and leaders be masterful, but let all seek to 
secure an administration of which all the 
people may be proud, and the party which has 
given the nation Lincoln, Grant, McKinley, 
and Roosevelt need not fear defeat. 



II. 

Speech at the National Arbitration and 
Peace Congress, New York City, 
April 15, 1907. 

It is not my function to deliver a formal 
address upon any of the topics which will en- 
gage your attention, but rather in the name of 
the State of New York to bid you a hearty 
welcome. It is my pleasant duty to express 
the gratification of our citizens at the meeting 
of this Congress and their appreciation of the 
important influences which must radiate from 
such a representative assemblage. 

It is fitting that this meeting should be held 
in a State representing in so conspicuous a 
degree the varied activities of peace, and in 
a metropoHs which focusses the energies of a 
people who, in beneficent concord, without 
desire of conquest or lust of power, are work- 
ing out their destiny inspired by national ideals 
of equality and justice. As a New Yorker, 
and as one representing the State in an official 

capacity, I find it agreeable to recall the names 

163 



i64 Charles Evans Hue^hes 



of its distinguished sons who have contributed 
in a marked manner to achievements in the 
interest of the peace of the world. You will 
not think it amiss if I claim for this role of 
honor the foremost citizen of the Nation, 
whose Federal activities have not obscured his 
relationship to his native State, and the lustre 
of whose fame as President of the Republic 
has been heightened by his service as pacifi- 
cator. And New York has also given to the 
Nation the eminent public servant who has 
addressed you, the keeper of our foreign inter- 
ests, in Avhose wise diplomacy every citizen is 
assured of the astute and jealous defence of 
our peaceful policies. We may also claim 
by right of his adoption the presiding genius 
of this Congress, whose personal interest 
and orenerous benefactions have contributed 
so notably to the progress of this world- 
movement. 

When the first Peace Congress met at The 
Hague, three of the six representatives of the 
United States were New Yorkers, — Andrew 
D. White, the scholar and veteran diplomatist ; 
that eminent citizen of this metropolis, Seth 
Low; and the lamented Frederick William 
Holls, the versatile secretary of the American 
Commission and the historian of the work of 



National Arbitration, 1907 165 

the conference. New York also should take 
special pride in the intelligent service in the 
cause of international arbitration which, long 
in advance of the meeting of that conference, 
was rendered by the lawyers of this State. 

In January, 1896, following an address de- 
livered before it by the Honorable Chauncey 
M. Depew, the New York State Bar Associa- 
tion appointed a committee to consider the 
subject of international arbitration, and to 
devise and submit to it a plan for the organi- 
zation of a tribunal to which international 
questions might be submitted. In April of 
the same year, after careful deliberation, the 
committee made its report, recommending 
the establishment of an International Court of 
Arbitration, to be composed of members 
selected by the agreeing nations and to be 
open at all times for the submission of contro- 
versies. The plan was laid before the Presi- 
dent of the United States, and later, as 
Secretary Foster states in his recent work, it 
became the basis of the instructions of the 
American delegates to The Hague Conference, 
and in accordance with this plan are found to be 
the essential features of the Permanent Court 
now in existence at The Hague. It is gratify- 
ing to trace this preliminary and influential 



1 66 Charles Evans Hughes 

activity of our public-spirited fellow citizens, 
and we of the State of New York welcome 
the members of this Congress with a cordiality 
emphasized by our long and sincere interest in 
the questions you are to consider. 

There are few, if any, to plead the cause of 
war in general, however it may be defended in 
particular. Statesmen and soldiers alike con- 
demn it, and against its monstrous cruelties 
and wastefulness, commerce and sentiment are 
allied. The necessity of war as a last defence 
of liberty and honor is admitted only to be 
deprecated, and in the desire to prevent armed 
strife there is almost complete unanimity. There 
may still be those who believe in the benefi- 
cent effects of the discipline of war, and who 
shrink from contemplating a society enervated 
by exclusive devotion to the pursuits of peace. 
Undoubtedly benefits have been conferred by 
war. Against the dark background of ruin, 
desolation, and death, the elemental virtues of 
humanity have stood out in bold relief. And 
aside from the important and beneficial results 
of certain wars, the world has largely learned 
its lessons of courage and fortitude, of the 
supremacy of duty and the sacred obligations 
of honor from those who, in fierce but heroic 
struggle, have revealed the noblest qualities of 



13 



National Arbitration, 1907 167 

humanity. " He maketh the wrath of man to 
praise Him." 

But while we justly appraise these conse- 
quences of past conflicts, we also know well 
their cost, and we keenly appreciate the fright- 
ful evils and the enormous wastes which have 
been incident to the evolution of the race 
through strife. We rejoice that the currents 
of progress lead to peace and that the time is 
sure to come when war will be unthinkable. 

We can no long^er look to war for the 
development of either national or individual 
character. The heroics of war have been 
replaced by mathematical calculations. If it 
was ever anything else, it is now unmitigated 
horror exhibiting chiefly fiendish aspects of 
ingenuity and scientific skill in destruction. 
Under our modern conditions of civilization, 
the supposed beneficent results of war in the 
development of courage and stamina must in 
any conceivable event be shared by so few of 
our teeming populations that even the most 
sanguinary must realize that the time has gone 
by when by any stretch of imagination it can 
be regarded as a general disciplinary agent. 
And in the controversies of peace and in the 
bloodless struggles for the maintenance of 
truth and justice in our personal and civic 



i68 Charles Evans Hughes 

relations, must be found the arena of the 
future in which character may find severer 
tests than ever were afforded by historic 
battlefield. 

We note with satisfaction the fact that war 
can now be waged only under onerous condi- 
tions, and the increasing pressure of economic 
considerations for the recognition of the funda- 
mental doctrines of the Christian faith. The 
growth of representative government with its 
restraints upon the ambitions of despotism 
in a just appreciation of the general welfare, 
our complex commercial relations ignoring 
national boundaries, and our growing intima- 
cies tending to make the world one society 
instead of a series of hostile camps, are re- 
ducing the possible causes of armed conflict 
and powerfully promoting the peaceful settle- 
ment of controversies. 

Much can undoubtedly be accomplished by 
the meeting of the representatives of the 
nations in the direction of perfecting inter- 
national law and in providing suitable con- 
ventions for the regulation of war. No doubt 
much that is of value can be secured in the 
more adequate protection of commerce and of 
property in time of war. 

But important as are these objects, the great 



National Arbitration, 1907 169 

purpose to be achieved is the prevention of 
war, and not its regulation. 

Among nations as among men, the require- 
ments of the sentiment of honor are subject 
to revision as conscience becomes more en- 
lightened and truer conceptions of personal 
dignity gain place. And it may be reasonably 
expected that public opinion, taken in connec- 
tion with the serious economic aspects of war, 
will gradually reduce the possible area of strife 
over questions thought to involve the national 
honor. The controversies which are incident 
to international business and exchanges, and 
those which relate to alleged violations of 
international agreements, may be composed 
without resort to arms. And without minimiz- 
ing the conditions which still exist, threaten- 
ing the peace of the world, we have reason to 
conorratulate ourselves that the reio^n of war is 
nearly over. 

In working for the interests of peace, regard 
may well be had to the influences which have 
thus far proved so successful. The end is not 
to be sought through coercion, or by the vain 
attempt to compel peace by force, but by ex- 
tending to the utmost provisions for delibera- 
tion and for conciliatory measures. 

The security of peace lies in the desire of the 



170 Charles Evans Hu^-hes 



fe' 



people for peace. Protection against war can 
best be found in the reiterated expression of 
that desire throuorhout the nations of the 
earth, and by convening their representatives 
in frequent assemblies. Provision for stated 
meetings of the Peace Conference, with their 
opportunities for interchanges of official opin- 
ion, the perfecting of plans for submission 
to arbitration, and the improvement of the 
machinery of the International Court indicate 
the lines along which substantial progress may 
be made. 

The people of the State of New York, 
cordial in their welcome to the delegates to 
this Congress, will watch its deliberations 
with sympathetic interest, earnestly desirous 
that throuorh these meeting's the united senti- 
ment of the United States may find effective 
expression. 



III. 

Address at the Dedication of the Buildings 
of the New York State College of 
Agriculture, at Cornell University, 
April 27, 1907. 

You have celebrated with fitting ceremony 
the hundredth anniversary of the birth of Ezra 
Cornell. Nothing could more suitably embody 
the spirit which animated him in the founding 
of Cornell University than this provision for 
instruction and experiment, for the spread of 
useful information, and for intelligent leader- 
ship in order to promote the agricultural 
interests of this State. 

The progress of civilization is perhaps most 
strongly marked by the widening of the area 
of instruction and the diminution of failures 
due to untutored and unrelated effort, through 
the establishment of schools for proper train- 
ing and for the communication under skilled 
direction of the lessons of experience. And 
the modern breadth of view with reference to 

scholastic purpose, and the rapid growth in 

171 



172 Charles Evans Hughes 

appreciation by the people of the benefit of 
scientific instruction, could have no more strik- 
ing illustration than the establishment, under 
the auspices of the State, in contact with 
schools of liberal arts, of politics, and of law, 
of this school of acrriculture. 

I am reminded of the occasion when, fifteen 
years ago, as a member of the staff of instruc- 
tion of this University, I listened to the 
inaugural address of its new president. I 
remember well the mingled expressions of con- 
cern as to the wisdom of his policy and admi- 
ration of his courage — not to say audacity — in 
announcing it. Rarely has there been vouch- 
safed to any prophet a clearer vision or a more 
complete fulfilment of his prophecy. Among 
other thinofs President Schurman then said : 
"From the very beginning Cornell University 
has paid special attention to the two subjects 
which more than any other vitally affect the 
interests of the majority of our people — I mean 
agriculture and veterinary science . . . We 
need an appropriation for a college of veteri- 
nary knowledge of at least $40,000 a year . . . 
and at the same time liberal provision should 
be made for aijriculture, includino- horticulture. 
The first and imperative need is that of a 
building large enough to house, along with the 



State College of Agriculture, 1907 173 

Department of Agriculture, those of horticul- 
ture, entomology, and dairy husbandry . . . 
The home of teachers and investigators, it 
should be made the living centre of all the 
agricultural interests of the State. Students 
would come for the regular courses or for 
short winter courses ; and those who could not 
leave their homes might receive instruction by 
correspondence. Bulletins would be published 
giving results of investigations. We should 
need at least $200,000 for the building and then 
such appropriations as would make the work 
in it worthy of the vast agricultural resources 
and wealth of this imperial State." 

All those who heard marvelled at his dream. 
But in 1894 a State Veterinary College was 
established, and an appropriation was made by 
the State for the construction and equipment 
of suitable buildings for its purposes. It has 
also received appropriations for its maintenance 
amounting to $25,000 a year. 

In 1904 the Legislature passed an act 
establishing a State College of Agriculture 
at Cornell University, and appropriated for 
the construction and equipment of its build- 
ings the sum of $250,000, and at the last 
session of the Lctrislature it received for 
its maintenance and for the promotion of 



174 Charles Evans Hu^^hes 



&' 



agricultural knowledge through the State an 
appropriation of $100,000. 

We may pause to congratulate President 
Schurman, not only upon his foresight, but 
upon the sagacity and vigor which has enabled 
him to accomplish his purpose. 

There are many engrossed in the great 
industrial activities of the State who fail to 
realize the importance of its agricultural in- 
terests. According to the last census, New 
York led the States in the value of its dairy 
products, of its hay crop, of its vegetables, of 
its flowers and plants, and of its apple crop, 
while in the value of its fruit and orchard pro- 
ducts it was second only to California. The 
value of its farm property is exceeded only in 
the case of three States. The State has no 
more important duty than to husband its 
agricultural interests. 

Much has been done in recent years to im- 
prove the condition of the farmer. The rural 
free delivery has brought him in closer contact 
with his fellow citizens and with the forces 
which make for progress in the State. The 
improvement of the roads of the State will 
greatly facilitate his access to markets. While 
he has the advantages of these external im- 
provements, he has the opportunity of taking 



State College of Agriculture, 1907 175 

part in the important and efficient organization 
of the State Grange for the protection and 
advancement of his interests. The State De- 
partment of Agriculture has a most important 
function, and among its other activities is now 
addressing itself to the very serious problem 
of farm labor. Its efforts have also facilitated 
the sale of abandoned farms. 

But much remains to be accomplished. In 
the press of the questions incident to the con- 
gestion of population in our great cities we 
must not foreet the demands of rural com- 
munities, and must not fail to take advantage 
of every opportunity to promote the welfare 
of that important portion of our population 
which, although not urban, has its own serious 
social and economic problems. 

We need scientific instruction in matters 
pertaining to farming — instruction with refer- 
ence to suitable farm machinery — with regard 
to the various matters which Director Bailey 
has aptly called " rural engineering," and in 
the various subjects which relate to rural life. 
We need not only instruction and experimenta- 
tion at this school, but the dissemination of its 
influence and the carrying to the people, 
through the various forms of extension work, 
of the information and the practical assistance 



176 Charles Evans Hughes 

and guidance which will help them in solving 
the problems of existence and in developing 
the aofricultural resources of the State. 

It is for these purposes that this school has 
been established. The statute provides: "The 
object of said College of Agriculture shall be 
to improve the agricultural methods ot the 
State ; to develop the agricultural resources of 
the State in the production of crops of all 
kinds ; in the rearing and breeding of live 
stock ; in the manufacture of dairy and other 
products ; in determining better methods of 
marketing and handling such products and in 
other ways ; and to increase intelligence and 
elevate the standards of living in the rural 
districts." 

Under the Act of Administration, while 
these buildings and equipment are to remain 
the property of the State, Cornell University 
is entrusted with their custody and control, 
and is authorized to administer this college, 
with authority to appoint investigators, teach- 
ers, and other employees, to lay out lines of 
investigation, to prescribe the requirements of 
admission and the course of study, and other- 
wise to exercise such power as may be needed 
for due administration. 

This is a sacred trust. To your administration 



State College of Agriculture, 1907 177 

the State has committed one of the most 
important interests of the people, represented 
in the establishment of this school. It is not 
a school to be administered for the benefit of 
Cornell University, but it is a school to be 
administered by Cornell University for the 
benefit of the people. We may view its future 
with confidence as we recall the services ren- 
dered in the past by those connected with the 
agricultural work of this University, and I am 
sure it is gratifying to the people to know that 
the work is to continue under the immediate 
supervision of that accomplished director. Lib- 
erty Hyde Bailey, to whose ability and energy 
this institution owes so much. And through 
wise administration and through the benefits 
which will result from the knowledge this 
school will disseminate, and the fruitful ex- 
perience it will record and communicate, Cor- 
nell University will be entitled to the respect 
and the gratitude which are the just due of the 
faithful execution of a public trust. 

President Schurman : On behalf of the State 
of New York, it is now my privilege and my 
agreeable duty to commit through you to 
Cornell University the custody and control of 
these buildings and property, constructed and 



178 Charles Evans Hu<^hes 



set apart by the State for the New York State 
College of Agriculture, and through you to 
commit to Cornell University the administra- 
tion of this college for the benefit of the people 
of the State. And in doing this I take pleasure 
in expressing my confidence in the administra. 
tion of this trust by Cornell University and 
my expectation that through this foundation 
the agricultural interests of the State will be 
notably advanced. 



IV. 

Address at the Unveiling of Tablets at the 
Hall of Fame, New York University, 
May 31, 1907. 

On this day, with grateful appreciation, we 
commemorate the valor and the sacrifices of 
those who, as representatives of the people, 
took part in the struggle for the preservation of 
the Union. With the passing of the years, the 
wounds caused by civil strife have been healed, 
and old animosities and sectional rivalries have 
given place to a common realization of our Na- 
tional destiny and to a common congratulation 
that we have remained a united people. And 
to-day we render the tribute of honor as well as 
of affection to the memory not merely of those 
who fell fighting for a victorious cause, but for 
all who in their unselfish zeal, following what 
they believed to be the right, revealed the 
heroic qualities of American manhood. 

While the ceremonies of this hour have no 
direct relation to the general observance of 
the day, it is fitting that among those who are 

179 



I So Charles Evans Hughes 

esteemed worthy of a place in this temple of 
illustrious Americans, and whose tablets are 
unveiled at this time, should be the great 
general of the Civil War, William Tecumseh 
Sherman. 

He hated war, but brought to its prosecu- 
tion the highest military genius. He ap- 
praised its horrors so justly that he had no 
patience with temporizing policy. But, by 
daring and original plans, carried out with 
mathematical precision and unrelenting de- 
termination to succeed, he hurried the advent 
of peace, which he sincerely desired. To him 
war was war — unrelieved, cruel war, — a terri- 
ble means to a righteous end. And he played 
his part heroically, brilliantly, and unllinchingly 
for the sake of the end he so clearly saw. 
And by reason of his originality, foresight, 
exactness, intrepidity, and success he placed 
himself in the first rank of military men. 

The soldier has so largely monopolized the 
plaudits and affection of mankind, not because 
of, but in spite of, the barbarities of war. 
Largely, of course, it has been due to the 
momentous political consequences of the suc- 
cess of arms, either in the defence of liberty or 
in the maintenance of national life, with wliich 
the people have felt their interests identified, 



Hall of Fame, May 30, 1907 181 

or in the increase of National glory which they 
proudly shared. But more largely the soldier 
has been honored, paradoxical as it may seem, 
because of love of humanity, and because 
through his work the noblest qualities of man 
have been placed in conspicuous relief. Endur- 
ance, poise, fortitude, unselfishness, disregard 
of personal danger, sagacity, discernment, swift 
and unerring analysis, exact calculation, the 
capacity for leadership and the mastery of 
men, single-mindedness and love of truth and 
honor, shining forth in a sincere and noble 
character at a time of greatest stress and peril, — 
these are the qualities which dignify humanity 
and, represented in the soldier under circum- 
stances fixing the attention of the nation and 
the world, call forth a universal tribute. And 
by the manner in which these severe tests have 
been met, we test the quality of a nation's 
citizenship. It is not the havoc wrought, the 
lives sacrificed, the disaster and the ruin caused 
by the victory, that win the admiration of man- 
kind, but the inflexible purpose, the intelligent 
plan, the undaunted courage, and the heroic 
self-abandonment, whether of victor or van- 
quished, which exercise the perennial charm 
and in their justification of humanity form the 
spell of ballad and of story. 



1 82 Charles livans Hughes 

We are rich in such memories. To-day two 
such heroes have their appropriate recognition 
in this temple of the illustrious. The one, who 
exhibited his extraordinary military capacity in 
the war that saved the nation ; the other, who 
dazzled the world with daring exploits in the 
war which made the nation possible. When 
John Paul Jones lashed the jib-boom of the 
Serapis to the mizzen-mast of the Bon Homme 
Richai'-d, and with his motley crew engaged 
the disciplined British in one of the most 
deadly conflicts recorded in naval annals, he 
magnificently exhibited the spirit w^hich won 
the War of Independence. It was not the 
physical results, but the moral effect of a 
victory achieved under extraordinary conditions 
and through rare personal valor, which gave 
it historical sicrnificance. 

But more and more clearly do we under- 
stand that what we should prize most is not 
the occasional revelation of noble qualities of 
manhood in bloody w^arfare, but in their culti- 
vation for purposes of peace, and their mani- 
festation in the every-day activities of an 
industrious people. Our attention is fixed 
upon the ideals of a peaceful society. And 
to-day we honor, not alone the heroes of 
conquest, but also the framers of our govern- 



Hall of Fame, May 30, 1907 183 

mental edifice, and the scientist, the author, 
and the teacher, men and women, notably 
influential in the development of our National 
life viewed in its broadest aspect. Among 
these are three men in the front rank of Amer- 
ican statesmanship. It is impossible in the 
brief word now permitted to attempt a just 
appreciation of their character and services. 
Two of them, Alexander Hamilton and James 
Madison, are identified with that initial period 
of our National history when the Constitution 
was in the making. It has been well said that 
the years immediately following the successful 
ending of the War of Independence were the 
most critical in our history. The struggle 
which, for want of effective union, had been 
unnecessarily prolonged, left thirteen inde- 
pendent republics with mutual jealousies and 
aversions and with discordant views and an- 
tagonistic ambitions. There was wanting a 
National consciousness. And the great victory 
won in the "War of Independence seemed to 
promise little more than the establishment of 
a number of petty governments arrayed against 
each other. But powerful as were the appar- 
ent forces driving the States apart, still more 
powerful was the pressure of common interests, 
too long imperfectly recognized, which were 



I §4 Charles Evans Hus^hes 



?5' 



destined to brincr them into an indissoluble 
Union. 

Finally, in 1787, the Federal Convention 
met at Philadelphia. Among the men of dis- 
tinguished merit who composed it, Washing- 
ton, Franklin, Hamilton, and Madison were 
pre-eminent. Perhaps no assembly ever sat 
to deliberate upon the problems of govern- 
ment with four men who could be called their 
equals. Hamilton and Madison were young, 
the one thirty and the other thirty-six. To 
these two more than to others we owe our 
Federal Constitution. The one has been 
justly described as its " principal author," and 
the other as its " most brilliant advocate." 

Hamilton was full of National spirit. He 
was the apostle of centralization and of National 
strength. Years before, when only twenty- 
three, he had set forth with rare lucidity and 
force the need of a " stronger government " 
with " an administration distinct from Con- 
gress." His was a master mind, acute in 
analysis, ready in construction, powerful in 
reasoning, capable in execution. But he lacked 
confidence in the people and in popular govern- 
ment. Nevertheless as a true statesman, he 
sprang to the defence of the work of the Con- 
vention, which had failed in large measure to 



Hall of Fame, May 30, 1907 185 

meet his views, and by the lucidity, force, and 
persuasiveness of his arguments broke down 
the opposition and prepared the way for the 
triumph of the Constitution. 

But great as was this service, even greater 
were his labors in establishing a system of 
government under the Constitution and in the 
constructive work of administration. As the 
first head of the Treasury Department, through 
his luminous reports and constructive financial 
measures, he insured at a critical time govern- 
mental stability and gave vigor to the National 
life. Under forms different from those which 
he preferred, the supreme objects of National 
strength and adequacy for which he mightily 
strove have been secured, and no one has more 
deeply impressed himself upon our National 
thought or infused into the workings of our 
Constitution a larger measure of his spirit and 
purpose. 

James Madison, the Virginian, took the 
leading part in the work of the Convention of 
1787. When Edmund Randolph presented 
to the Federal Convention the Virginia plan, it 
was no secret that the work was largely that 
of Madison. He was a profound student of 
political history, and by his leadership in the 
Convention won the title of the ** Father of 



iS6 Charles Evans Huijhes 



^^' 



the Constitution." It is to this work and to 
the papers which he contributed to the Feder- 
alist that he owes his transcendent fame. 
Later he served the country in Congress, as 
Secretary of State, and as President. But in 
his long career he never showed to the same 
advantage as when he brouQrht his rare talents 
and the constructive skill of the student of 
government to the task of framing our funda- 
mental law. The statesman was largely lost 
in party politics, and as President he was 
called to tasks foreign to his abilities. But 
his service to the Nation in connection with 
the work of formulating its scheme of govern- 
ment will keep his fame imperishable. 

It was this feeling which prompted the senti- 
ment uttered by John Quincy Adams, the third 
American statesman whose tablet is unveiled 
to-day, on the death of Madison in 1836 : 

"Of the band of benefactors of the human race, the 
founders of the Constitution of the United States, James 
Madison is the last who has gone to his reward. They 
have transmitted the precious bond of union to us, now 
entirely a succeeding generation to them. May it never 
cease to be a voice of admonition to us, of our duty to 
transmit the inheritance unimpaired to our children of 
the rising age." 

Few careers in our history have been so 



Hall of Fame, May 30, 1907 1^7 

distinguished for variety of important public 
service as that of John Ouincy Adams. 

Only ten years the junior of Hamilton, he 
lived until 1848. Under Washington he was 
Minister to The Hague, to Portugal, and to 
Prussia. Later he was State Senator and 
United States Senator. After an eventful 
mission abroad as Minister to Russia, and as 
one of the commissioners in the negotiations 
which led to the Treaty of Ghent, he became 
Secretary of State under President Monroe, 
whom he succeeded as Chief Magistrate. Re- 
tiring at the age of sixty-two, he subsequently 
entered upon the most important part of his 
career as Member of Congress, serving for 
about sixteen years, until he received the 
death stroke on the floor of the House. 

To Mr. Adams must be attributed the first 
suo-eestions of what has come to be known as 
the Monroe Doctrine. In 1823 he informed 
the Russian Minister " that we should contest 
the rights of Russia to any territorial establish- 
ments on this continent, and that we should 
assume distinctly the principle that the Ameri- 
can continents are no longer subjects for any 
new European colonial establishments." This 
was the precursor of the famous declaration 
in President Monroe's message. 



1 88 Charles Evans Huuhes 



&* 



Ever characterized by independence and de- 
votion to what he beUeved to be the right, his 
old age was devoted in no small part to the 
contest against slavery. With an indomitable 
spirit and extraordinary^ power in debate, strong 
in his absolute conviction of the righteousness 
of his cause, he was willing to stand alone, un- 
terrified and unconquerable. His chief title to 
fame rests not upon official honors nor upon 
his holding- the highest ofhce in the Nation's 
gift, but upon his service as the well-equipped 
and dauntless champion of human rights in 
our national assembly. 

On an occasion like this we are vividly im- 
pressed with the fact that monuments may 
perpetuate names and form imperishable rec- 
ords, but they cannot confer fame or make 
enduring the respect of mankind. To serve 
their appropriate purpose they must record 
what is already written in the hearts of the 
people and stand as tribute to the continued 
esteem which alone they are powerless to per- 
petuate. In the review of our Nation's history, 
short as it is, the petty schemes of political 
manipulators, the unconsequential victories in 
conflicts for the spoils of office, and ignoble 
efforts of selfishness appear in their true pro- 
portions. The Nation is a sound critic and it 



Hall of Fame, May 30, 1907 189 

pays its final homage to those who with inflexi- 
ble purpose and fidelity to conscience have 
devoted their talents unreservedly to the serv- 
ice of the people. The trickster, the intriguer, 
and those who seek to win by strategy what 
public confidence will not bestow, quickly pass 
out of the notoriety which they may tempo- 
rarily achieve, unless by reason of exceptional 
ability they may live to point a contrast. The 
Nation is jealous of its ideals, and it never has 
been more insistent upon the straightforward 
conduct of public affairs than it is to-day. It 
demands of its representatives single-minded 
devotion to public duty and a knightly sense of 
honor in the administration of public office. 
We should lose no opportunity to enforce the 
lessons which may be drawn from the lives of 
those illustrious Americans by whom we as a 
people have been so richly served. And from 
their labors, of which these exercises are a 
fitting recognition, we may draw inspiration 
which will enable us to go forward undismayed 
to meet the problems thrust upon us by our 
rapidly extending activities. 



V. 



Address at the Jamestown Exposition on 
Jefferson Memorial Day, July 5, 1907, 
in Connection with the Reunion of the 
Descendants of the Signers of the 
Declaration of Independence. 



" We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created 
equal; that they are endowed by their Creator -with certain inalien- 
able rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of 
happiness; that to secure these rights governments are instituted 
among men deriving their just powers from the consent of the 
governed" — Declaration of Independence. 



The immortal words of the preamble of the 
Declaration of Independence recorded more 
than a protest against exactions of the British 
crown. They were more than an assertion of 
the right of the Colonies to be independent 
States. They passed beyond the necessities of 
the moment and transcended perhaps in their 
broad import the sentiment of many who, ex- 
asperated by tyrannical demands, were ready 

190 



Jamestown Exposition, 1907 191 

to renounce their former allegiance. They 
have the perennial value of a political creed 
voicing in terms of conviction the aspirations 
of humanity. They suggest to us the long 
struggle against the usurpations of power and 
the impositions of avarice and cunning. They 
have been ridiculed as fallacious ; they have 
sustained the assault of those who, descanting 
upon obvious physical, mental, and moral in- 
equalities, have sought to obscure the profound 
truth of equality before the law and the inalien- 
able rights of manhood. To-day, as always, 
they present to us the standard by which we 
may judge the successful working of our insti- 
tutions. And gathered upon this historic spot 
in the Commonwealth which nurtured him, we 
may fittingly pay our tribute to the author 
of these words, in the language of Lincoln : 

" All honor to Jefferson — to the man who in the concrete 
pressure of a national struggle for independence by a 
single people had the coolness, forecast, and sagacity to 
introduce into a merely revolutionary document an ab- 
stract truth applicable to all men and all time, and so 
embalmed it there that to-day and in all coming days 
it shall be a rebuke and a stumbling-block to the very 
harbingers of re-appearing tyranny and oppression." 

The attitude of men toward government by 
the people is not determined by party lines. 



192 Charles Evans Hughes 

The man who would ignore the riglits of his 
fellow citizens, who would establish himself in 
a fortress of special privilege and exercise his 
power, small or great, in opposition to the 
welfare of others, may be found in all parties 
and in every walk of life. It is an attitude 
sometimes explained by training and environ- 
ment, but in general merely exhibits the rule 
of selfishness. There are many who have no 
sympathy with the principles of the Declara- 
tion and who look with alarm upon every 
emphatic assertion of popular rights. There 
are many others who will join in an appeal to 
democratic principles when it serves self- 
interest, but are ready to use every vantage 
point that may be gained in the struggle for 
existence to deprive their fellows of equal op- 
portunity. But we may be assured that the 
progress of the people will not be halted. The 
long contest with "divine right," with usurped 
power however obtained, against every attempt 
under any form to control and exploit the many 
for the benefit of the few, can have but one 
result. Slowly and surely the people have won 
their way, and no final settlement will be 
reached until the administration of government 
squares with the principles of the Declaration 
and an end has been put to every conversion 



Jamestown Exposition, 1907 193 

of governmental powers to selfish purposes. 
We may properly congratulate ourselves 
upon the marvellous record of the Nation's 
progress. With resistless energy the vast do- 
main between the oceans has been developed 
and its remotest parts have been knit together 
by mutual needs and the multifarious activi- 
ties of an ever-increasing commerce. The 
skill of a people rich in invention, endowed 
with boundless ambition and rare capacity for 
organization, has made available our natural 
wealth and has made our industrial achieve- 
ments the marvel of mankind. Our develop- 
ment has intensified the sentiment of national 
unity, and despite our wide extent of territory 
and notwithstanding the many differences 
exhibited in our population, we are a people 
united not merely in form or by convention, 
but in interest and sentiment. An unparal- 
leled prosperity has blessed our efforts. And 
never has the sun shone upon a more indus- 
trious and happy people, enjoying to a larger 
degree equal rights and equal opportunities 
than those who gather to-day under the Stars 
and Stripes to commemorate the birth of 
American liberty. 

Once more we extol the heroism and states- 
manship of those who laid the foundations of 



13 



194 Charles Evans Hughes 

the Republic but dimly conscious of its des- 
tiny. We bless the soil that gave them birth 
and the traditions under which they were nur- 
tured. We come in a reverential spirit to the 
Old Dominion, the mother of statesmen, where 
within the space of a few years were given to 
the world George Washington, Patrick Henry, 
Thomas Jefferson, Edmund Randolph, James 
Madison, John Marshall, and James Monroe. 
But we would draw little inspiration from their 
lives and from the fascinatino- record of their 
formative days, if we gave ourselves over to 
mere jubilation. We are a progressive people. 
We are loyal to our ideals. We refuse to be 
content with mere material achievements. Nor 
are we satisfied with comparison with other 
nations or with earlier times. We desire that 
this Nation shall realize its highest possibilities. 
We contemplate the future with serious deter- 
mination and a solemn sense of oblic^ation. 

The lesson of to-day is that every patriotic 
American should look upon his country's his- 
tory and destiny in the light of the principles 
of the Declaration of Independence and with 
sincere sympathy with democratic ideals. In- 
stead of looking askance at every expression 
of determination to vindicate popular rights, it 
should be welcomed. So long as the spirit of 



Jamestown Exposition, 1907 195 

1776 is abroad in the land there will be no con- 
donation of abuses, and material prosperity 
will not be permitted to serve as a cover for 
public wrongs. 

Jefferson had no patience with the doc- 
trine of Montesquieu that a republic can 
be preserved only in a small territory. " The 
reverse," he said, " is the truth." We are for- 
tunate in having a distribution of powers and 
in the maintenance of local autonomy through 
units conserved by historical and sentimental 
associations. We live under a Constitution 
wisely guaranteeing a division of powers be- 
tween the Federal and the State governments 
so that each may exercise its appropriate au- 
thority. We have no need to look with con- 
cern upon increasing activities of the Federal 
Government so long as they are pertinent to 
the accomplishment of Federal objects and do 
not interfere with the exercise of the powers 
of the States in the conduct of their local af- 
fairs. But we may properly become alarmed 
when State governments lack vigor and effi- 
ciency in the protection of their own citizens 
and in the control of the exercise of the 
franchises they have granted. There is no 
incompatibility between vigorous State ad- 
ministration looking after its own affairs and 



196 Charles Evans Hughes 

strong National administration dealing with 
National questions and supervising by strict 
and adequate regulation interstate commerce. 
Both are essential ; and in the proportion that 
the people insist upon efficient and responsible 
administration of local affairs are they likely 
to secure a proper and responsible exercise of 
Federal authority, whatever its necessary ex- 
tent within its constitutional sphere. 

Ours is not and was not intended to be a 
pure democracy. It is impracticable that the 
people should administer the government di- 
rectly. They govern through representatives. 
For their protection they have by direct legis- 
lation created constitutions fettering the power 
of their representatives and establishing safe- 
guards by which they are secure in their per- 
sonal liberty and in the results of their thrift. 

We note with satisfaction the increasing 
sense of responsibility to the people on the 
pas't of those who represent them. Efforts to 
dominate legislation for selfish purposes and 
attempts through the forms of popular election 
to place in office those who, in the guise of 
executing public trusts, serve private interests 
are less successful than heretofore. The peo- 
ple have become intolerant of such traitorous 
representation. And it is entirely within their 



Jamestown Exposition, 1907 i97 

power to put a stop to it altogether. Political 
leaders who have performed the function of 
clearino-.houses for lesfislation and who, while 
posing as party workers, have served under a 
retainer of special interests, careless alike of 
party principles or of public justice, are passing 
from the stage. The people demand leader- 
ship, and parties need effective organization 
to advance their principles. But the time is 
rapidly passing when any one can long main- 
tain a position of wide political influence who 
is under suspicion of maintaining a double 
allegiance. 

But we need more than escape from such 
prostitution of political power. The people 
are entitled to have unselfish leadership and 
unselfish representation. Popular government 
will not attain its ideal until it becomes a point 
of honor for political leaders not to make their 
political fortunes the test of their action. This 
in the light of human nature may seem a coun- 
sel of perfection. But the people are rapidly 
becoming more conscious of its necessity 
and more critical of its absence. And as we 
advance it will become more obvious to the 
active political worker that disinterestedness is 
essential to successful leadership. 

We are also encouraged by the Insistence 



198 Charles Evans Hughes 

upon the performance of pubHc obHgations. 
The indienation that has been feh with refer- 
ence to the conduct of large public enterprises, 
notably in the case of our transportation cor- 
porations, has been due on the one hand to 
the efforts they have made to attain their ends 
by debauching the administration of govern- 
ment, and on the other hand to their failure to 
perform their obligation in giving fair and im- 
partial service. Their misuse of the privileges 
which the people have bestowed, their manip- 
ulation of securities, their malign influence in 
leo-islative halls, have had their natural result in 
creating a deep feeling of public resentment. 
This feeline is most wholesome. It would 
indeed be cause for alarm if at a time of 
great prosperity the people were servile in 
the presence of financial power and remained 
supine under abuses of public rights. 

Coincident with the insistence upon more 
faithful representation in the administration of 
government, upon the performance of public 
obligation by our great corporations, we find 
throughout the business world a more general 
recognition of the responsibilities of fiduciary 
relation. This is but another phase of the 
general public attitude toward all who hold 
relations of trust and confidence, whether in 



Jamestown Exposition, 1907 199 

politics or in business. It is but an aspect of 
a wholesome demand which is beingf voiced 
from the Atlantic to the Pacific for the honor- 
able conduct of affairs. 

There is also cause for gratification in finding 
the standards of administration raised. It is 
inevitable with an alert and intelligent people 
that as the business of government increases 
greater attention should be paid to the manner 
in which it is discharged. We may look for a 
steady improvement in the public service, and 
on its civil side, — in the sentiment of honor 
and of disinterested fidelity that may attach to 
it, — it may rival what has long been conspicu- 
ous in connection with our military and naval 
organizations. The State is entitled to the 
best, and this we may hope the enlightened 
patriotism of peace will ultimately secure. 

There may be those who think that to attain 
the ideals of popular government changes In 
our organic law are necessary. But there is 
no warrant for chancre until conscience and 
public spirit obtain from our existing institu- 
tions what they are able to confer. An honest 
and intelligent electorate can secure the repre- 
sentation to which it is entitled. Public 
opinion formed after full discussion of pend- 
ing questions exerts a force wellnigh irre- 



200 Charles Evans Hughes 

sistible. As Jefferson said : " Responsibility is 
a tremendous engine in a free government." 

It has been the fear of those who distrust 
popular government that it would lead to ex- 
cesses and that sound judgment would from 
time to time be displaced by the fury of an 
excited populace. The safeguards of democ- 
racy are education and public discussion. Our 
country is safe so long as our schools are full. 

There are those who speak the language of 
conservatism but whose underlying purpose, 
only thinly veiled, is to protect those who 
have betrayed the public and to prevent neces- 
sary remedial action. There are others who 
resort to inflammatory appeal, careless of the 
interests which would be sacrificed by the arbi- 
trary and ill-considered action they propose, 
or defend. We may believe that the people 
will not be deceived by either. With extra- 
ordinary unanimity they have supported Presi- 
dent Roosevelt in his courageous and vigorous 
administration because they have believed that 
he voiced the sentiment of fair play. It is this 
sentiment more than any other that dominates 
American life. 

Our interests are inseparably connected. 
We cannot by arbitrary legislation afford to 
disturb our industrial enterprises. There are 



Jamestown Exposition, 1907 201 

millions of wage-earners who depend for their 
daily bread upon the stability of our business 
interests. 

But there is no reason why rapacity should not 
be restrained and public obligation enforced. 

Those who are loyal to the ideals of popular 
government are anxious that the people should 
vindicate their supremacy, and in so doing 
should safe^ruard their essential interests. 
This may be done if they use the powers of 
government deliberately and justly. The 
people of this country are not at war with 
business or with honorable business organi- 
zations. They have no desire to fetter lawful 
enterprises or to impair the confidence which 
is essential to the maintenance of our pros- 
perity. They do desire to thwart every 
attempt to secure or retain an improper ad- 
vantage through unjust discriminations or 
crovernmental favoritism. If those who are 
sympathetic with this desire will encourage 
the just and reasonable disposition of each 
question upon its merits and promote the rule 
of common sense, we shall attain the desired 
end and prevent democracy from suffering at 
its own hands. 

We stand in the presence of those related 
by blood to the illustrious signers of the 



202 Charles Evans Huehes 



t5' 



Declaration of Independence. They rejoice In 
their distinguished lineage. But we are all 
the spiritual sons of these fathers of our liber- 
ties. We have a priceless heritage. This 
great country, populated with an intelligent 
people animated by the loftiest ideals, presents 
unexampled opportunity. May we be worthy 
of our birthright and so deal with the prob- 
lems confronting this generation that we may 
transmit to our children a still larger boon, 
and that they, enjoying even to a greater de- 
gree equality of opportunity, may find still 
better secured the inalienable rights of life, 
liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. 



VI. 
Address at Chautauqua, August 24, 1907. 

These meetings furnish evidence of the 
alertness, earnestness, and zeal for mental and 
moral betterment which characterize the Ameri- 
can people. Their restlessness, their eagerness 
to know and to do something worth while are 
symptoms of health. The multiplying courses 
of our universities having relation to social and 
political subjects, our institutes of research, 
our voluntary assemblies for mutual improve- 
ment, our varied philanthropic associations, 
our organizations in every line of commercial 
and intellectual effort, reflect the intense desire 
for progress. 

There are a few, fortunately only a few rela- 
tively, who devote themselves to ease and 
self-indulgence, awakening passionate remon- 
strance by the spectacular incongruity of their 
lives as contrasted with American ideals. But 
the attitude of many of these, conscious of 
their lack of popular esteem, is apologetic. 

The typical American does not seek idleness, 

203 



204 Charles Evans Hu^^hes 



t>' 



but work. He wants to justify himself by 
proved capacity in useful effort. Under dif- 
ferent conditions, he still has the spirit of those 
who faced the wilderness, advanced the out- 
posts of civilization, and settled a continent of 
matchless resources, where has been laid the 
basis for a wider diffusion of prosperity among 
a great population than the world has ever 
known. To whatever department of activity 
we turn, after making all necessary allowances 
for ignorance, shiftlessness, and vice, we still 
find throughout the country, dominant and 
pervasive, the note of energy and resistless 
ambition. The vitality of the people has not 
been sapped by prosperity. The increase of 
comfort has not impaired their virility. We 
are still a hardy people, equal to our task, 
and pressing forward vigorous and determined 
in every direction to enlarge the record of 
achievement. 

It is easy, looking at phases of our life in 
an absolute way, for one who is pessimistically 
inclined to gather statistics which superficially 
considered are discouraging. Congestion in 
our great cities, the widened opportunities for 
the play of selfishness, and the increase of 
temptations following in the wake of prosper- 
ity give rise to an appalling number and variety 



Chautauqua, August 24, 1907 205 

of private and public wrongs whose thousands 
of victims voice an undying appeal to humanity 
and patriotism. But one would form a very 
inaccurate judgment of our moral condition 
by considering these wrongs alone. They must 
be considered in their relation to other phases 
of our life. We must not fail to take note of 
the increasing intensity of the desire to find 
remedies and the earnestness with which all 
forms of evil and oppression are attacked. 

The ethical sentiment of our country is not 
to be judged by statistics of formal relations 
to particular institutions. It must be deter- 
mined by the general ethical standards of the 
people and their vital regard for sobriety, 
virtue, and fiduciary responsibility. It may 
largely be judged, not by what they approve 
in conventional phrase, but by what they 
sharply condemn and refuse to tolerate in con- 
crete cases. I believe that the moral stand- 
ards of the American people were never more 
sound than they are to-day. Considering the 
tremendous increase in the opportunities for 
wrongdoing, the seductive and refined tempta- 
tions, and the materialistic appeals that are 
incident to our present mode of life, and the 
material comforts which invention and com- 
merce have made possible, I believe that the 



2o6 Charles Evans Hughes 

manner in which the ethical development of 
the people has kept pace with their progress in 
other directions may fairly be called extraor- 
dinary. It is really because our ethical stand- 
ards are so high that we fail more frequently 
to take to account this fact. 

In saying this I am not at all unmindful of 
how far short we come of an ideal state of 
society. On the contrary, existing evils are 
the more noticeable because they stand out in 
strong contrast to the desires and aspirations 
of the people. We have had disclosures of 
shocking infidelity to trust and to public obli- 
gation, but more important than the evil dis- 
closed was the attitude of the people toward 
it. Cynics have no audience in this country. 
Devotion to duty and strict discharge of honor- 
able obligation to both individual and public 
are not hypocritically preached, but are the sin- 
cere and insistent demand of the American 
people from one end of the land to the other. 
Individual shortcomings are many, but the 
moral judgment of the community is keen 
and severe. In this we find just cause for 
satisfaction. 

For years there have been many prophets 
of civic right-doing, who have been preaching 
good government and insisting that citizens 



Chautauqua, August 24, 1907 207 

should take a more active interest in pubHc 
affairs. To-day the American people are more 
alive to the importance of impartial and honor- 
able administration than ever before. They 
do not simply discuss it ; they demand it. 
While in many communities administration is 
controlled in the selfish interest of a few to 
the detriment of the people, that which is 
most characteristic of our present political life is 
the determination that selfish abuse of govern- 
mental machinery shall stop. 

Our country may be likened to a man of 
excellent constitution and native visfor who is 
determined by a proper system of hygiene and 
suitable rules of conduct to correct disorders 
in his system and come as closely as possible 
to perfect health. And in taking account of 
his condition he may have a pardonable pride 
in finding that there is no evidence of decay 
in his vital functions, and that there is every 
indication of fundamental soundness and of 
steady improvement. It may be added that 
the improvement will be much more rapid if he 
aims to avoid undue excitement of his nervous 
system. 

When the public conscience is awake and 
the people are no longer insensible to their 
social and political needs, what is most 



2o8 Charles Evans Huehes 



&' 



required is careful analysis of existing evils, a 
true diagnosis, and skilful treatment. Social 
and political affairs are the affairs of men and 
women, of human beings with their variety of 
good qualities and many imperfections. They 
cannot be dealt with after the manner of chem- 
ical reactions in a laboratory. Despite all the 
advantages of democracy, perfect scientific 
treatment of political conditions cannot be 
expected, for that would imply perfect human 
nature. With that, it would be easy to realize 
happiness either with a minimum or maximum 
of government. We necessarily deal with ap- 
proximations. And we Americans, endeavor- 
ing to make a true appreciation of present 
conditions, may justly be proud of the high 
character of our citizenship and of the advance 
which has been made ; and with a new realiza- 
tion of the preciousness of our birthright and 
the serious importance of our obligation, we 
should set ourselves determinedly to the work 
of all necessary correction. 

We are a good-natured people and we wish 
no harm to any one who does right. We are 
simply set upon procuring the doing of the 
right thing in the right way in all our public 
relations. 

Our prosperity has its source in our agri- 



Chautauqua, August 24, 1907 209 

cultural and mineral resources, in our industry, 
in our talent for effective effort, and in our 
moral strength and mutual confidence. All 
these are essential, and the last as well as the 
first. 

Confidence depends upon the assurance of 
stability. By stability is not meant fixity of 
things or relations, but steadiness. It may be 
steadiness in motion. Paradoxical as it may 
seem, human society cannot be stable unless it 
is progressive. That is because growth and 
progress are the law of our nature. 

Under certain forms of government, stability 
has been maintained by force exercised for the 
benefit of a privileged few and without regard 
to the necessities of the great masses of the 
people. In a democracy stability depends 
upon the reign of reason, and it is the fact 
that we are a common-sense people that gives 
us assurance for the future. 

Reason demands the facts. By the require- 
ment of publicity is not meant scrappy sensa- 
tionalism or distorted emphasis. It is the 
demand that public affairs and business which 
is of a public nature because of its relation to 
the public interest shall be conducted in the 
light of day, and that the public shall have 
the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but 



14 



2IO Charles Evans Hughes 

the truth In regard to the matters that concern 
them. The emotions, in proper control, sup- 
ply the power necessary to accomplish results, 
but the judgment must not be displaced by 
passion. 

Reason implies patience. This is the hard- 
est lesson for democracy to learn. It is not 
meant that unnecessary delays should be tol- 
erated, or that obstacles should not be sur- 
mounted by determined effort. It does not 
mean weakness or paltering ; it simply means 
a desire to bring about good order by orderly 
processes ; It means recognition of our mutual 
dependence, of our complex relations in so- 
ciety, and of the necessity that our efforts In 
social progress should not be haphazard nor 
spasmodic, but steady, sober, and persistent. 
Reason fights evil with the drill and precision 
of regular troops. 

Reason In its rule of governmental activities 
demands even. Impartial, and consistent en- 
forcement of the law. Stability and confi- 
dence can never be assured save by strength 
and firmness. Nothing so quickly undermines 
society as a failure to enforce its laws. No 
one is secure in his life, in his liberty, or In his 
daily wage, save as this is a government of 
law whose strong arm compels obedience to 



Chautauqua, August 24, 1907 211 

its mandates, the expression of the people's 
will. It is an egregious blunder to suppose 
that to make the administration of government 
and the enforcement of law a matter of caprice 
involves danger only as to the subject directly 
concerned. The evil cannot be so confined, 
but poisons the whole governmental system. 

Care in making laws and firmness and im- 
partiality in executing them are the securities of 
our peace. Lax, corrupt, unintelligent, or vacil- 
lating administration not only causes dissatis- 
faction but inevitably leads to ignorant and 
extravagant demands. Strong, even-tempered, 
and dignified administration, relentless and im- 
partial, favoring neither rich nor poor, know- 
ing no motive but its manifest duty, compels 
respect, and by the very certainty of its opera- 
tions conserves the public confidence. In this 
way alone can we secure intelligent considera- 
tion of existing defects or of needed remedial 
measures. Pure and efficient administration 
is the foundation of social progress. 

Whatever natural causes may account for 
the development of any particular form of 
government at any time or place, the object of 
government, philosophically considered, is to 
secure the happiness of the individual who 
so conducts himself as to permit the equal 



212 Charles Evans Hug^hes 



&' 



happiness of others. Democracy has con- 
stantly to struggle against three abuses. 

The first is the abuse of the freedom allowed 
for individual effort. This is illustrated by 
concerted attempts on the part of those who 
find themselves in a strong position to put 
others at disadvantage by unfair means. It is 
the business of a free government, desiring so 
far as possible to give each individual a fair 
chance, to put a stop to improper practices de- 
signed to restrict the area of opportunity. 

Then there is the abuse of privileges received 
from the government itself, the misuse of pub- 
tic franchises granted upon condition that they 
shall be used to benefit the public. It is the 
business of a free government to secure the 
just use of such franchises for the public 
benefit. 

There is also the abuse of the system of gov- 
ernment itself by prostituting representative 
powers to selfish advantage. 

To guard against these abuses and put an 
end to them where they exist, the people must 
be constantly alert. Faithful representation of 
the people is of the essence of the matter. 
Democracy upon a large scale would inevitably 
fail were not the people able to act through 
their chosen representatives. It is only upon 



Chautauqua, August 24, 1907 213 

simple and broad propositions of policy that 
the people can act directly. It is difficult to 
procure a complete understanding, even by 
those charged with its consideration, of any 
complicated measure. 

We have a republic only in name if those 
chosen to represent the people serve other 
interests. In their insistence upon singlemind- 
edness in the public service, the people will 
have no compromise. They demand a greater 
voice in the selection of candidates for office. 
They insist that those whom they choose shall 
recognize their representative responsibility. 
We have had too many men posing as the 
people's choice who were simply the repre- 
sentatives of particular business interests or 
the appointees of a political leader put in office 
to do his bidding. Party organization must 
find its bond of union in devotion to certain 
common principles. There are relatively few 
communities in which it can longer hope to 
win public support if its political power is 
devoted to the advancement of the selfish 
interests of its members. 

We shall always need political leadership. 
The work of analysis, of careful study of ex- 
isting problems, of devising necessary remedies 
for admitted abuses, of representing to the 



214 Charles Evans liup^hes 



people the course to be taken for their pro- 
tection, must be done. There must be organ- 
ization in order that measures conceived to be 
in the public interest may have proper sup- 
port. But leadership and organization to 
recommend themselves to public confidence 
must be purged of the vice of self-service. 

Let there be no vague fears about the out- 
come. I place full confidence in the sobriety 
and integrity of motive of the American peo- 
ple. I have profound belief in their ability to 
cure existing evils without disturbing their 
prosperity. I am convinced that we shall 
have more and more intelligent and unselfish 
representation of the people's interests ; that 
political leadership will be tested more and 
more by the soundness of its counsel and the 
disinterestedness of its ambition. I believe 
that with an increasing proportion of true 
representation, with increasing discriminating 
public discussion, with the patient application 
of sound judgment to the consideration of 
public measures, and with the inflexible deter- 
mination to end abuses and to purify the ad- 
ministration of orovernment of self-interest, we 
shall realize a greater prosperity and a wider 
diffusion of the blessings of free government 
than we have ever hitherto been able to enjoy. 



VII. 

Speech at the Washington County Fair, 
Sandy Hill, N. Y., August 27, 1907. 

Fellow Citizens: 

I am very glad that the first County Fair 
that it is my good fortune to visit should be 
held in Washington County, the home of my 
early childhood. When I came down the 
streets a few minutes ago on the way to these 
grounds forty years were obliterated, and in 
front of the old barn I saw a little child being 
lifted by his father, to sit upon the cream- 
colored family horse, and I saw a little chair 
upon a small stoop in which that little child 
used to sit. I heard, dimly, but memory could 
almost reconstruct the scene perfectly, the 
strains of martial music, and saw in my mind's 
eye the brave men gathered together, and not 
for show, solemnly surrounded by tearful friends 
in the awful hour of the Nation's peril. Men 
gathered to say good-by, and the pastor, my 
father, close at hand saying a word of comfort 

as those men were ready to march to the front 

215 



2i6 Charles Evans Hufjhes 



t>' 



in the defence of the Union, — dimly, and yet 
I can see it. And I remember in a faint way, 
but still the agony of it impressed my childish 
heart, the awful strain, the cry of anguish 
when the news came of the death of our 
martyred President. 

Though we may travel widely through the 
world, and life may bring to us many changes 
of scene and vicissitudes of fortune, yet we 
never grow old in our hearts. And nothing can 
take away from us the memories of our early 
years or destroy the affection that we hold, — 
whatever changes of population or changes in 
external conditions may affect the scenes of 
our early life, — for that which, as a child, 
we learned to call home. And to me, the 
world in those days was bounded by Glens 
Falls and Fort Edward, and the centre of it 
was Sandy Hill. 

Now, I did n't come here to-day to tell you 
how to run your industries, or to manage your 
farms. You know a great deal more about 
that than I do, and because I have been 
chosen Governor of the State, I don't assume 
suddenly to have acquired a great deal of in- 
formation about your business. You know 
what is good for you in your daily vocation ; 
you know what you need, and I don't assume 



Washington County Fair, 1907 217 

to appear here as an instructor. I do come 
here simply to show my pleasure at the 
opportunity of greeting my fellow citizens, 
and to talk over with you in an informal 
and direct way some of the matters that 
immediately concern you and me in con- 
nection with the administration of our 
government. 

We do not properly consider government 
as something aloof from us. We constitute 
the people of the State, and there is no one 
who is not affected by good or bad adminis- 
tration. I hope the time will come when 
every one engaged in industrial employment 
will have closely at his heart the needs of 
those enofagfed in aofriculture, and those who 
are devoted to the cultivation of the soil 
should have consideration and concern for 
the lot of those who are sweating in the fac- 
tory and shop. We are necessary to each 
other. We are one people, and we should 
learn to know that in connection with matters 
of government there can be no division into 
classes, either according to fortune, or accord- 
ing to lot and vocation. But we shall be 
successful or the reverse, according to the 
realization of our common citizenship and our 
determination all to pull together to make this 



2i8 Charles Evans Hughes 

the greatest and most prosperous country the 
world has ever known. 

Now, the principles of government are very 
simple. The principles of government may 
be difficult in their application, but they are 
obvious to any student, to anyone who pauses 
for a moment to consider the affairs of his 
State. Fundamentally, the great thing is local 
government. When we think of administra- 
tion, we are accustomed to look far away from 
home, to Albany, to a remote place where sit 
the leaders of the State. The place to look 
primarily in order to secure good government 
and good administration is at your own home. 
We have great need to emphasize the im- 
portance of local government and the sense 
of accountability to each locality or community 
of those who in that locality or community 
have immediate charofe of local affairs. Now 
it is a principle of administration that you 
want to have done locally all that you can get 
done locally, and as little done away from 
home as may be necessary to the maintenance 
of free institutions. That is the way to have 
good government, and therefore, to the extent 
of my ability, during the legislative session, I 
aimed to refer to local communities the matters 
which should be within their exclusive control. 



Washington County Fair, 1907 219 

It is not the proper thing to run to Albany 
to see whether the salary of some local official 
should be increased. It is not the proper thing 
to run to Albany to get a special bill relating 
to this or that matter, which properly should be 
committed to the discretion of the local board. 
The true rule of government is to have the 
local board attend to the things that affect the 
locality, and to have the people of the com- 
munity hold that local board responsible for 
the way it does business. 

It has been said to me again and again, not 
by representatives of this county I will say, 
but by representatives of other counties : 
" Why, that will never do. You don't know 
our condition. If the local board is to attend 
to this matter, what will become of us ? We 
can't get anything done ! " My friends, that 
means that you have no confidence in free in- 
stitutions. You can't expect good republican 
government, unless in each locality there is 
good citizenship enough to hold men account- 
able for the performance of a public duty in 
connection with those matters which every 
citizen knows affect him and his business in 
the running of the community in which he has 
his home. 

And therefore I say the first principle of 



2 20 Charles Evans Hughes 

administration is to keep things in connection 
with local government locally administered so 
far as possible. But of course, as I said, the 
best thing we can do is to make an approxi- 
mation. We can't ^et everything perfect in 
this world and the less so because the Legisla- 
ture from time immemorial has been passing 
special bills affecting particular localities, and 
you are hidebound in many respects, and can't 
adjust things without other special bills. And 
the result is that one special bill becomes the 
parent of a progeny of special bills increasing 
in oreometrical ratio with the generations. I 
have been sitting there in Albany trying to 
maintain a few obvious principles of our dem- 
ocratic government and I have been appalled 
at the enormous mass of local special legisla- 
tion that I had to sign, simply because of the 
other special legislation which had preceded 
it. But that does n't mean that we can't do 
our best and somewhere draw the line which 
it seems practicable to draw ; and wherever I 
could draw it without doing injustice and 
occasioning injury to local communities, I 
have drawn it, and I have said : " Settle your 
own affairs." 

But, of course, every local government, prop- 
erly considered, is an arm of the State, and 



Washington County Fair, 1907 221 

however great the importance of its local ad- 
ministration it is the State that is the organism 
of the people and is responsible for administra- 
tion everywhere. It was a great question 
many years ago as to how this division should 
be properly maintained — how the State should 
do its duty. It has been practically guaran- 
teed by reserving to the Governor of the State 
the power of removal of certain local officers 
upon the presentation of charges after they 
have been sustained by proper evidence and 
after hearinof has been afforded. 

That was intended, on the one hand, to en- 
force local accountability through the process 
of election and appealing to the people of the 
community ; and, on the other hand, in case of 
a breakdown, to give the State an opportunity 
to guarantee, perhaps to a minority, a properly 
administered government and to give its repre- 
sentative the chance for necessary correction. 
But while the Governor must do his duty, — 
he is charged with the enforcement of the law 
and he must not hesitate, if a case is made, 
to act in accordance with his responsibility, — 
it is the greatest mistake in the world to run 
to Albany to hold the men whom you elect 
accountable for the discharge of their duties 
when you can attend to the matter at home. 



22 2 Charles Evans Huehes 



<:?' 



And then, when we go a step farther, we 
find, not simply with reference to these matters 
of local administration but generally, the im- 
portant principle that we should settle these 
things by general legislation, and not by laws 
for special instances. You would be surprised 
at the number of people there are in this 
State trying to get something special for them- 
selves from the State Government. There 
seems to be an idea on the part of a good 
many that the State is a fair mark whether it 
is an *' easy mark " or not ; and that does not 
apply simply to individuals, it applies to com- 
munities. A great cry for something special — 
something for me, something for my town, 
something for this, an advantage over some- 
body — what do we care for the rest, if we can 
only get it through the Legislature and get 
the Governor to siorn it ? 

That is not the true way of running the 
State Government. Why should we have 
special claim bills, for example, in favor of A., 
B., C, and D. as to this and that matter? If 
a member does not have large influence in the 
Legislature, his particular constituents, how- 
ever praiseworthy their demands, have no 
chance. But if, on the other hand, the member 
is an influential man : if he is a man of great 



Washington County Fair, 1907 223 

importance not simply locally but in the Legis- 
lature and in the councils of its chief commit- 
tees, — why then it goes. And it comes up to 
the Governor, and Mr. A., fortunate as a con- 
stituent of this distinguished member, gets his 
claim, and B., C, and D., who have not had an 
equal influence, are left out. Now I don't call 
that proper and decent government. 

So I say this : If we have n't got rules, — 
general rules that are fair and square as to 
claims, — let us make them fair and square ; let 
us amend them. If the jurisdiction of our 
Court of Claims is not broad enough to cover 
all classes that should be brought within it, let 
us make it so. But let us no more pass one of 
these bills than we would pass a bill enlarging 
the jurisdiction of one of our general courts to 
let in a particular case. The only difference is 
that the people have not been fully educated 
to it. Tremendous pressure is brought upon 
a man in the case of a claim of apparently 
great justice. If he says : " In consideration 
of its equities I will sign that," he must sign a 
lot of others by reason of those he has signed 
before, until finally he says : " It Is all over. 
I will sign anything you give me." 

Now the only way to do is to have some 
principles of administration and stand by them, 



2 24 Charles Evans Hu<^hes 



and so far as possible stand by general laws 
because they are fair, because they are impar- 
tial, because they don't depend upon what this 
particular man is able to do by reason of his 
acquaintance with another particular man, and 
because they depend upon fundamental prin- 
ciples of reason applicable to all men in each 
particular case. That is free government. Free 
government and proper representation are not 
a matter of "pull" at all ; they are matters of 
fairness and justice. 

And now that comes home to all of you, 
good friends, in your particular community. 
If you want that medicine for others, take it 
yourself ; and don't ! don't ! bombard your 
representatives who go to Albany trying to 
do the square thing and not only to represent 
their community but to represent fairly the 
entire State, by trying to have them get some- 
thing for you which you know if they were try- 
ing to get for somebody over in Essex County 
you would say was not right. We have got to 
deal with these things impartially and with re- 
gard to all the general operations of the govern- 
ment of the State. While of course once in a 
while we can, as I say, have absolute rules, 
exceptions will occur; but in the main let 
us try to have general principles of govern- 



Washington County Fair, 1907 225 

ment, adhere to them, and make them work 
uniformly. 

The great need with regard to government 
in this country is that the people shall feel 
that it works impartially and squarely and no 
one eets the advantacje over his fellows. 

Now, we have had legislation of great impor- 
tance during the last session touching the vital 
interests of the people of the State. I believe 
that it would be hard to find a session of the 
Legislature in which so much general legislation 
of great importance has been enacted. We 
have, for example, the question of the control 
of the operation of our public-service corpora- 
tions. It is a question of great importance to 
all the people ; to the farmers, to those engaged 
in industry, to those engaged in commerce, — 
one of the great questions of the day. There 
are some people who would have this pass 
upon the general view that you don't under- 
stand it and the quicker you do something, 
the better. That would be like a man pro- 
fessing to be a surgeon who would jab his 
knife in here and jab his knife in there to see 
how the patient stood it and then gradually, 
after these repeated jabs, make up his diagnosis 
and see what the proper surgical treatment 
should be. 
15 



2 26 Charles Evans Hughes 



^5' 



I believe that the way to deal with these 
matters is to understand them; is to have the 
government and its administration supreme; is 
to show the people of the State that there is no 
corporate power or financial power that has 
any strength to defy the will of the people; 
that they are going to have a fair understand- 
ing of the facts and compel a just exercise of 
public franchises. That is what we stand for. 
We want to see crreat extension of our trans- 
portation facilities; we want better stations; 
we want more cars; we want better power; we 
want to see our goods moved ; we want more 
comfort and convenience in our travel ; we want 
good service. We are bound to get it. We 
are not going to be fooled by the people who 
tell us that they can't do these things and live, 
under fair reo;ulation. On the other hand, we 
are not going to prevent them from doing these 
things, by absurd and impossible rules. The 
people of this country are perfectly fair and 
square in this matter. The great difficulty is 
that the problem is so intricate in many of its 
phases that some say : " What is the use ? You 
can never understand it." 

I say that the government is perfectly com- 
petent to find out the facts, to secure good 
treatment, to enforce the regulations under 



Washington County Fair, 1907 227 

which these franchises should be conducted, and 
to see that every citizen of the State gets good 
service at reasonable rates ; and that is what 
we have been trying to provide governmental 
machinery for in this State. I believe that we 
have accomplished a great deal in this direc- 
tion. We have men devoting themselves 
exclusively to the understanding of these prob- 
lems. We are going to have things done right, 
— thoroughly, fairly, and as the people want 
them done, in recognition of the obligations of 
these corporations to the State. 

And in these matters, as I have said, the 
great thing is to provide machinery so that the 
people will feel that they are represented ; 
that they are not held down ; that they can 
get at things ; that there is someone with the 
original power of investigation ; that there is a 
board representing the government that can 
act, with adequate power to enforce a fair rule 
when the justice of it has been shown. Now 
we have looked at the matter squarely and 
with the approval of the people of the State 
from one end to the other have got that 
machinery ; and now we are going to see that 
it works well and that everything that can be 
done is done to protect the people. 

We have a great variety of questions. Of 



22 8 Charles Evans Hughes 

course, fundamentally, the thing is for every 
individual to have a fair show to do his work. 
Fundamentally, the thing is to have the greatest 
freedom of opportunity and not to interfere 
with individual exertion. But, on the other 
hand, the State, representing — being, in fact — 
all the individuals of the State together, must 
see that no one individual gets an opportunity 
at the unjust expense of his neighbor, and that 
those matters that can be taken care of only by 
concerted action will be taken care of in a way 
that will defend the interests of all. 

For example, the State has entered upon a 
great undertaking for the development of our 
roads, — a matter of the greatest advantage to 
the agricultural communities of the State, in 
order that they may get to market and the 
exchanges and that their intercourse may be 
facilitated. But in connection with that, while 
I am going to say nothing about it in detail 
to-day, let me suggest this, — that it is perfectly 
idle to have new roads unless we have a proper 
means of maintaining and keeping roads fit. 

With regard to the adulteration of foods ; in 
all matters affecting the public health ; in the 
operations of commerce; in all those things 
which are essential to the public good, the State 
must interfere and by a strong hand protect 



Washington County Fair, 1907 229 

the people. I shall not attempt to go over the 
various steps taken at the last session in this 
direction, but we have made great progress in 
connection with the Agricultural Department; 
in connection with the Labor Department ; in 
connection with our public-service regulation ; 
in connection with a great many subjects in 
which you are all interested. 

Let me say this in conclusion : You can't 
do anything by multiplying these efforts of the 
administration unless you can get the men 
to run the machinery ; unless you can get men 
with a sense of honor and fidelity to duty who 
can be depended upon to take the State view, 
not against your view, but against their own 
interests. That Is the test. To take the State 
view, — the high view of citizenship, — the sense 
of honorable obligation to all the people which 
would make a man rather cut off his and than 
cheat a man who doesn't see him when he 
does it. 

The great point Is to have that self-respect 
which will make it the greatest service that a 
man can render. In his own opinion, to be true 
to a sense of duty when he has a chance to 
serve the people ; to take up the work with the 
proper sense of responsibility and devote him- 
self to it, — not because he wants a re-election ; 



230 Charles Evans Hui^hes 



not because he wants another office ; not be- 
cause the people will shout their applause, but 
because it is riijht and his own conscience will 
not let him do anything else. 

We can't do anything in regulating corporate 
business ; we can't do anything in attempting 
to protect public health; to encourage agricul- 
ture ; to make industry safe and prosperous, — 
we can't do anything unless human character 
which enters into all administration is the 
character upon which you can depend, as 
citizens, for fidelity and honesty. And the 
development of that character depends in turn 
upon the standards of the communities just like 
this. What will you tolerate in public life? 
Whom do you allow to represent the people ? 
Let us have it thoroughly understood that a 
man walks to his political doom who thinks of 
anything else but the public welfare in connec- 
tion with public office. 



VIII. 

speech at the Dedication of the McKinley 
Monument in Buffalo, September 5, 
1907. 

The memorials of a free people are erected 
to commemorate public service and the dis- 
tinction of noble character. The conqueror, 
lustful of power, and the seeker after self- 
aes^andizement are not counted amonor the 
heroes of democracy. The people honor those 
who, in their service to their fellow men, honor 
humanity. 

Here was marked the tragic termination of 
a orreat career. Here in an awful moment 
there were revealed in sudden lurid flash the 
opposing forces whose conflict is the history 
of mankind. At a time of rare prosperity^ 
when American industry and commerce were 
celebrating their triumphs with every circum- 
stance of proud display in a city of almost 
unprecedented progress, the powers of dark- 
ness moved to their attack and, in an infernal 

frenzy of hate, an abject creature struck down 

231 



232 Charles Evans Hughes 

the foremost and best-loved of American citi- 
zens. Never did evil commit a more dastardly 
deed. The victim was the chosen representa- 
tive of the American people, no less repre- 
sentative in his death than in his life. The 
assassin's blow was aimed at American institu- 
tions, represented in the head of the Nation, and 
McKinley fell because he was our President. 

In memory of his martyrdom, in memory of 
an heroic death, in testimony to the futility 
of insensate envy and the lasting supremacy of 
law and order, in memory of a worthy life 
crowned by its sad sacrifice, this monument 
has been erected. 

The vitality of democracy may be measured 
by the generosity of its tributes to fidelity and 
its appreciation of honorable motive and public 
spirit. The people must have faith in them- 
selves, and the zeal which makes progress pos- 
sible is not only intolerant of treachery to the 
public interest, but expresses itself in fine en- 
thusiasm for the leaders who have justified the 
people's confidence. Cynicism is a destroying 
canker. And in proportion as we revere those 
who in the past have borne the burdens of the 
Republic, gratefully recognize our indebted- 
ness to their service, and profit by the lessons 
of their experience, shall we prove our capacity 



McKinley Monument, 1907 233 

to meet the demands and solve the problems 
of a later day. In our warm affection and our 
tender reverence for those great spirits who in 
the providence of God have led us as a people 
we find the surest basis for our present trust. 
An ungrateful republic cannot endure. 

It is not my purpose in this brief exercise 
to attempt to recount the services of him in 
whose honor we meet. They are an imperish- 
able part of the Nation's history. Soldier, 
Representative, Governor, President — these 
were the stages of his distinguished career. 
Having fought gallantly in his youth, through- 
out the period of civil strife, to preserve the 
Union, it was his high privilege in his last 
years to preside over the destinies of the 
Nation when, with a revived and intensified 
National consciousness we assumed the en- 
larged and unexpected responsibilities which 
followed upon a war carried to notable victory 
under his leadership and supported by the 
people in an unselfish enthusiasm for the cause 
of humanity. It was his happy lot to be 
chosen the Chief Executive of the Nation 
after a contest which vindicated the sanity of 
the public judgment and established new con- 
fidence in the working of our popular institu- 
tions. With restored credit, the country under 



234 Charles Evans Hug^hes 



&' 



his administration, quickly recovering from the 
depression of trade, entered upon a period of 
extraordinary expansion and prosperity, Wil- 
liam McKinley sought patiently to learn the 
people's will and faithfully to execute it. 

It is a significant and gratifying characteris- 
tic of the American people that, more than the 
particular benefit conferred by service, they 
prize the virtues of character which in the 
course of service are exemplified. Fidelity to 
friendship, the exquisite grace of a husband's 
devotion, the honor of manhood, the beauty 
of the forbearance of unwearied patience, en- 
deared William McKinley to the hearts of his 
fellow citizens, and in their memory eclipse 
the glories of an administration flattering to 
American pride. 

We may see but dimly into the future. We 
may be confused by the perplexities of our 
modern life, made the more difficult by the 
very riches of our inheritance, but as we set 
our course by the pole-star of truth and justice 
and conserve the ideals of character which our 
fathers have taught us to revere we shall not 
fail. 



IX. 

Address at the National Encampment of 
the Grand Army of the Republic, 
Saratoga, September lo, 1907. 

The State of New York welcomes you to 
this encampment. And on behalf of the citi- 
zens of the State it is my privilege to express 
their greeting, their felicitations, and their af- 
fectionate regard. Your meeting is at once a 
memorial, a contrast, and an inspiration. 

Ineffaceable is the memory of the days of 
national peril and of fratricidal war. Once 
more in this tender comradeship you live 
through the period of civil strife — days of 
separation and of sorrow, of privation and of 
danger — but days hallowed by friendship ce- 
mented by a common sacrifice and made the 
more sacred by the losses of the years. It is 
not for me to portray the scenes which are so 
vivid in your minds, or to recount the heroic 
deeds which are your title to enduring fame. 
It would be almost an impiety for me to attempt 

to essay the role of your comrades who need 

235 



236 Charles Evans Hui^^hes 



C5 



neither the narrative of history nor the poetry 
of imagination to make eloquent the memories 
of their own experience. But I should utterly 
fail adequately to represent the citizens of 
New York or to voice the gratitude of the 
"generation whese active life be^an after the 
Civil War had closed, if I did not testify to 
their appreciation of the rich inheritance the 
Nation has received at your hands. 

The service of heroic sacrifice transcends 
even the vast importance of a restored Union 
and a preserved National life. The Union is 
but an opportunity. The Nation exists not 
for the sake of political relations or of forms of 
government, but to confer the blessings of 
freedom and in order that the people, in the 
diffusion of happiness and in the development 
of character, may realize the ideals of liberty. 
However perfect the Constitution, however 
symmetrical the political edifice, the end is at- 
tained only to the extent to which we rise 
above what is sordid and in our achievements 
illustrate the virtues of sacrifice and honor. 
We are blessed with riches of soil and mines ; 
our natural resources are the envy of the world. 
But more important than these are the re- 
sources of moral strencrth and the inheritances 
of memories which inspire us to work zealously 



Grand Army of the Republic 237 

for the common orood and inculcate lessons of 
patriotic devotion to the cause of liberty. 

I congratulate you upon your share of this 
great contribution, upon the lasting affection 
of a united people, upon the blessed memory 
of painful and consecrated effort and of highest 
duty well performed. By your courage and 
endurance, by your patient fortitude, by your 
unwearied persistence, by your steadfastness 
in defeat, and magnanimity in victory, by the 
heroic service of your leaders, by the noble 
humanity of our martyred President, by the 
work of all who at home or in the field, in 
humble station or in great place, toiled and 
sacrificed for the life of the Nation, — our 
people have been pricelessly endowed. The 
Nation so preserved and so enriched can never 
foro^et its mission. 

Your meeting points a contrast. We are to- 
day a united people rejoicing in undissolved 
and indissoluble union. The heroism displayed 
on both sides of that great conflict has be- 
come a common heritage. Past animosities are 
buried without forgetting past services. No 
line north or south, east or west, divides us in 
our devotion to National ideals. Year by year 
we more highly appreciate the necessity and 
value of this unity, and North and South join 



238 Charles Evans Hus^hes 



to-day in thanksgiving to God that we are 
marshalled under one flag, enjoying the peace 
and prosperity which union only can secure. 

Your meeting, with its imposing reminder 
of patriotic sacrifice, cannot but serve as an 
inspiration to fidelity in public service. The 
same flag which floated over the armies in the 
field floats over the public buildings in which 
are gathered the chosen servants of the people. 
That flag for whose honor you were ready to 
give your lives demands the same loyalty in 
time of peace. Patriotism is not limited to 
times of National conflict, but Is equally ex- 
pressed in every form of service where love of 
country rises above love of self. If the same 
generous ardor. If the same readiness to put 
the cause of the Union above all personal con- 
siderations, which characterized your service on 
the field of battle, is displayed In the administra- 
tion of every department of our government 
and in the maintenance of the cause of the 
people against every form of corruption and 
oppression, we may look forward to victories 
of peace no less significant and notable than 
those In which you won and conferred a lasting 
lory. 



cr 



X. 

Address at the Dedication of the Monu- 
ment to General Greene at Gettys- 
burg, September 27, 1907. 

We have come to this field of eloquent 
memorials to pay a deserved tribute to one 
who in supreme test vindicated his manhood 
and his leadership. We are here as New- 
Yorkers to commemorate the fidelity and 
valor of a son of New York. We have met 
as citizens on consecrated soil where in se- 
verest conflict the heroism of two armies 
glorified the American name, and in the victory 
of one was found the sure promise of a re- 
stored Union and of the happiness of these 
later years. 

In diminished ranks, mourning their de- 
parted comrades, yet rejoicing in the mem- 
ories of those heroic days, the survivors of 
battle have gathered in honor of the brave 
leader under whose command the desperate 
eno-aeement on this hill was foucrht. 

Veterans : To you these stones are quick 

239 



240 Charles Evans Hughes 

with life. You live again in the comradeship 
of war, and those who fell and those who lived 
to fall elsewhere are once more by your side. 
Each bit of ground has its story of daring, of 
resolute defence, of suffering, of death. Here 
in patriotic devotion you offered your lives, 
and the memory of your steadfastness in 
that dark hour is one of the choicest of our 
National treasures. 

The Civil War was not more notable for its 
political consequences than for its revelation 
of the quality of our citizenship. Priceless as 
is the National unity gained through that strug- 
gle, its value rests upon that sterling character 
and capacity for heroic effort which in both 
North and South found abundant illustration. 
The virtues displayed on either side of that 
fierce contest are the common heritage of a 
united people. And alike in heroism upon 
battlefield and in the fortitude and untold 
sacrifices of those who remained at home, in 
the skill, the discernment, and the energy of 
leaders, in the discipline, readiness, and valor 
of the troops they led, stood revealed the 
splendid pertinacity, the inflexible determina- 
tion, and the moral forcefulness of American 
manhood. 

New York is prouder of the manner in 



General Greene, Sept. 27, 1907 241 

which it met that test than of its broad do- 
main and wealth of resources. It sent to the 
Northern Army 400,000 of its sons — one-fifth 
of its male population. In every part of this 
battlefield will be found the records of New 
York troops — records of fidelity and honorable 
achievement. On this spot, at a critical mo- 
ment, when darkness added to the terror of 
sudden attack by superior numbers, our New 
York boys of Greene's Brigade held firm and 
by heroic defence protected the safety of the 
Army. To their sagacious, alert, and coura- 
geous General, we, the sons of the Empire 
State, erect this monument, expressive of our 
love, our pride, our lasting obligation. 

The feneration which fousfht here has al- 
most passed away. The distinguished leaders 
still with us, and in whose presence we rejoice 
to-day, recall to us the more vividly the many 
who have departed. Their sacrifices were not 
in vain. The same National character which 
accounted for the fierceness of that strife in 
whose devouring flames were displayed the 
indestructible riches of moral strength, is ours 
to-day. The same patriotic ardor fills the 
breasts of American youth as when they 
rushed from field and factory and college in 
obedience to their country's summons. The 

16 



2 42 Charles Evans Huohes 



wives and mothers of America are as loving, 
as devoted, as ready to sacrifice and to suffer 
as were those of forty odd years ago. The 
men of the United States are as quick to re- 
spond to the call of duty, as keen, as resource- 
ful, as valiant as those of our heroic past. 
They are blessed with the memory of your 
labors ; they are enriched with the lessons of 
your zeal ; they are inspired by the example 
of your patriotism. 

We are engrossed In the pursuits of peace. 
Mind and nerve are strained to the utmost in 
the varied activities which promise opportunity 
for individual achievement. But the American 
heart thrills at the sight of the flag, the Ameri- 
can conscience points unwaveringly to the path 
of honor, the American sense of justice was 
never more supreme in its sway, and united by 
a common appreciation of the ideals of a free 
government, by a common perception of our 
National destiny, by a common recognition of 
the riches of our inheritance, the American 
people should, and we believe will, go steadily 
forward, a happy, resourceful, and triumphant 
people, enjoying in ever greater degree the 
blessings of liberty and union. 



I 



1 



XI. 

Speech at the Jamestown Exposition on 
New York Day, October lo, 1907. 

New York gratefully accepts the invitation 
of Virginia to join in this feast of origins. 
We turn from our eager searching of the 
future to eather confidence and to learn wis- 
dom from the record of the past, and once 
more we scan the ever fascinating pages of 
the wonder-book of American history. In 
contrast to an old world ravaged by greed and 
unprincipled ambition, where for centuries the 
toil and blood of the people had been given to 
the service of privilege and of the rivalries of 
despotic rulers, lay this broad land of match- 
less resources, enshrouded by its vast and 
silent forests, awaiting the fulness of time 
when it should become the domain of a Nation 
dedicated to freedom, and the scene of the 
greatest triumphs of humanity. 

Widely separated, distinct in purpose, vary- 
ing markedly in the character and equipment 

of the settlers were the first efforts at coloniza- 

243 



244 Charles Evans Hughes 

tion. How apparently unrelated were the 
entrance of the little company of Englishmen 
between the Capes in 1607, the voyage of 
Henry Hudson up the river which bears his 
name in 1609, and, a few years later, the 
landine of the Pilg^rims on the northeastern 
coast. We marvel that these feeble and ap- 
parently insignificant efforts should have re- 
sulted in flourishing colonies ; that these 
colonies with forms of organization originally 
so diverse, with interests distinct and often in 
conflict, jealous of each other and widely scat- 
tered, should have ever become confederated 
Commonwealths and able to oppose a united 
front to tyranny ; that these Commonwealths, 
drawn together for one supreme struggle and 
then relapsing into bitter disagreement, should 
have found it possible at a time of disorder bor- 
dering upon anarchy to have formed a Nation ; 
and that the Nation so formed and so com- 
posed should have been able to resist all tend- 
encies to disintegration, and should now present 
to the world the spectacle of a people firmly 
bound by mutual interest and affection and 
welded together in an indestructible Union. 

With the advantage of a truer perspective 
we see the irresistible progress of the senti- 
ment of unity until to-day the National con- 



Jamestown Exposition, 1907 245 

sciousness is dominant from the Atlantic to 
the Pacific, and from the Lakes to the Gulf. 
With the rapid extension of commerce and 
facility of communication, aided by the mo- 
bility of our population, the interests that we 
have in common have exceeded in ever greater 
degree those which are separate and distinct. 
And the people of all parts of the Union 
come to the scene of this early English settle- 
ment not as visitors to a strang-e Common- 
wealth but as fellow citizens of their brothers 
in Virginia. They feel by virtue of their 
National relationship a direct interest in the 
events which led to the settlement of the Old 
Dominion, and rejoice in their inheritance of 
the benefits of the services which Washington 
and Jefferson, Madison and Marshall gave to 
our common country. 

While this is so, it is fortunate that we 
retain a just pride in the history, achieve- 
ments, and prosperity of our respective States. 
It is well that this should be fostered, for upon 
this sentiment to a large degree will depend 
the efficiency of State administration. As the 
range of community of interest widens, it is 
inevitable that the burden of National adminis- 
tration should increase and that the cares 
necessarily committed to the National Govern- 



246 Charles Evans Hughes 

ment should multiply. But we cannot expect 
to have that competent and vigorous adminis- 
tration in National concerns which is essential 
to our continued peace and prosperity if our 
citizenship is indifferent to the problems of 
administration which confront them in their 
several communities. State and National 
citizenship reside in the same persons, and they 
cannot be effective as sources of National power 
and at the same time be lax or corrupt in local 
administration. Fortunate it is that we are 
not compelled to create arbitrary divisions for 
the purpose of appropriate local government, 
but that we have autonomous communities 
which have been developed naturally, and the 
citizens of which enjoy the advantages of his- 
torical and sentimental associations. In State 
interest and State pride we find the hope of 
the proper conduct on the affairs appropriate 
to the States, and in the development of the 
sense of civic obligation which demands good 
local ofovernment we shall make sure of that 
quality of citizenship which will secure the inter- 
ests of National administration and National 
progress. 

I am proud to be a citizen of New York 
and I rejoice in its wealth and its resources, 
material and moral. I shall not attempt an 



Jamestown Exposition, 1907 247 

inventory of its possessions, nor shall I re- 
count to you the munificence of its provisions 
for education, the extent of its charitable 
foundations, the wide scope of its large public 
undertakings. With these you are familiar. 
And at the mention of the State of New York 
you, the sons of that State, gathered here in its 
honor, at once have presented to your minds 
an imposing Commonwealth comprising one- 
tenth of the population of the United States, 
justly termed by reason of its riches and its 
power, the " Empire State." 

It has been my good fortune to become 
closely acquainted with its citizenship and to 
attest the high standards and noble qualities 
of its people. To every line of activity it has 
contributed leaders of thought and action ; its 
citizens are alert and energetic; and in no 
community in the land may be found a higher 
level of civilization, more moral power, more 
strength of character, more happiness and 
prosperity. 

But it is a world in itself. It presents the 
most complex problems of our modern times. 
It exhibits strikinof contrasts. It has the 
greatest wealth and the most abject poverty. 
Side by side with thrift and education and 
virtue may be found the depths of squalor, 



248 Charles Evans Hughes 

ignorance, and vice. While in rural communi- 
ties and small cities may be found American 
life at its best, in the congested quarters of the 
great metropolis humanity huddles in poverty, 
distress, and shame. Government, State and 
municipal, is put to the severest tests. And to 
the thoughtful mind the emotions of just pride 
and the thrill of pleasure at our material and 
moral advances must stimulate the sense of 
obligation and of the most serious responsi- 
bility. It is in New York, where in so large a 
deeree is found the clearing-house of the Na- 
tion's commerce and where riches have been 
accumulated beyond the dreams of a genera- 
tion past, that we must devote ourselves most 
sedulously to the realization of the ideals of 
democracy, and set ourselves most determinedly 
to overcome the subtle temptations and nar- 
rowing influences of prosperity. 

First of all, we must overcome the tempta- 
tion to indifference as to the condition and 
standards of our less favored brothers in the 
community. The fool who said that his barns 
were full and that he might take his ease has 
his counterpart in those who through material 
success would erect little citadels of indepen- 
dent strength where they may entrench them- 
selves in calm indifference to the needs of their 



Jamestown Exposition, 1907 249 

less fortunate brethren. In this country no 
one is independent of his fellows and the 
security of every man must ultimately depend 
on the opportunities and well-being of others. 
Intelligent and sympathetic consideration of 
conditions in our great cities is the duty of 
every good citizen. The condition of those 
who enter our State, forming virtually foreign 
communities in our cities, is a problem to which 
as citizens of the State we must give heed. 
We must endeavor to determine what can be 
done to improve standards of living, to protect 
these newcomers, largely helpless, from being 
victimized, to acquaint them as rapidly as pos- 
sible with the meaning of American institutions, 
to utilize their economic value, to protect the 
State by promoting the diffusion of the Am- 
erican spirit and reverence for law and order 
through fair and impartial administration. 

We rejoice in the numerous efforts of philan- 
thropy, in the large contributions that are made 
in personal service ; but what has been done 
and is being done covers but a small fraction 
of the need. We must have a quickening of 
the sense of obligation and a keener recognition 
of the fact that Union is more than a name, 
that it is not a union of theoretical entities, but 
a union of human beings, — a union of lives, — 



250 Charles Evans Hui(hes 



^5' 



that for better or worse we are bound too-ether 
by indissoluble bonds and that indifference to 
the condition of our fellow man is indifference 
to the safety of the State. 

As prosperity increases we must be the 
more zealous to maintain our early ideals of 
work and of service. It is of the essence of 
democracy that a man should have oppor- 
tunity for the exercise of his talent, — that he 
should have a fair opportunity to display his 
ability and to win the just rewards of his 
efforts, — that he should be secure in the re- 
sults of his labors, won almost invariably 
through sacrifice and self-denial. 

It is also of the essence of democracy that 
no man should construe his opportunity to 
mean license to exploit his fellow men and 
unjustly profit himself at the expense of their 
equal chance. It is of the essence of democ- 
racy that community rights should be safe- 
guarded and that to which the public is 
entitled should be rigorously com.pelled. Tlie 
ambition wliich knows no law but that of 
selfish achievement must be bound by the 
inexorable demands of public service and 
the limits necessarily imposed for the equal 
protection of all citizens. 

He most surely attains the highest success 



Jamestown Exposition, 1907 251 

and the greatest happiness who in the zealous 
exercise of his talents finds the path of service, 
and whose achievements are a benediction to 
mankind. 

But what is most needed, in a particular 
sense in the interest of g-ood administration of 
government and of the welfare of the com- 
munity, is a stricter insistence upon fiduciary 
responsibility. This can be obtained in part 
by the enforcement of law and in part must 
be gained through public sentiment and the 
cultivation of higher standards of conduct. 
It is an extraordinary perversion to suppose 
that the owner of fifty-one per cent, of the 
capital stock of a corporation is free to wreak 
his pleasure in its management. The officer 
or director occupies a position of trust not for 
the majority, but for the entire body of stock- 
holders. And while he may execute the policy 
which the majority desire, it must be a policy 
consistent with orood faith and fair dealinof 
with all. Nothing is more reprehensible than 
the abuse of power on the part of those who 
act in a representative capacity. 

The test of character may be found in the 
faithful discharge of trust where it may be 
abused in secret and with seeming impunity. 
Every man has his sphere of fiduciary obliga- 



252 Charles Evans Hughes 

tion. I speak of it not in the narrow sense 
in which the term is employed in courts of 
law, but in the broader sense recognized by 
every man of self-respect. The lawyer owes 
it to his profession to maintain the dignity 
of independence, and is false to the trust 
conferred upon him when he is admitted to 
practice as an officer of justice, if he permits 
himself to become the tool of unprincipled 
manipulators. The editor shamelessly ignores 
his obligation when he hides or distorts the 
facts or uses his columns to pervert the public 
judgment. 

Of highest importance is the sentiment of 
honor and the sense of fiduciary obligation 
in connection with public service. The people 
will tolerate no cynicism here. Parties may 
dispute as they will over principles and poli- 
cies, but there can be no dispute with refer- 
ence to the demand that public privileges 
shall be granted only in the public interest, 
and that public officers shall regard only 
the public interest in the administration of 
government. 

The cry "Every man for himself" is out 
of date. The demand of the future will be 
" Every man for the people." No one can be 
permitted to put private interest above the 



Jamestown Exposition, 1907 253 

public advantage. And thus in recognizing 
the necessity of giving fair opportunity for 
individual success, of protecting thrift and the 
rewards of industry, and at the same time in 
insisting upon fidelity to trust, upon the rights 
of the community and upon the supremacy 
of law representing the will of the people, in 
endeavorinof to call the most efficient to the 
service of the State, and in discharging the 
duties of public office with sole regard to pub- 
lic interests, shall we diffuse the blessings of 
prosperity, making it servant to the happiness 
of all. 

We in New York should rejoice in the op- 
portunity which is afforded us by the very 
difficulty of the problems with which we are 
confronted. In tracing the history of the past 
we find abundant reason for encouragement. 
The capacity of American manhood in each 
generation to deal successfully with the con- 
spicuous evils of its day has been abundantly 
demonstrated. 

We are far better off in the Empire State 
than we have ever been before. A resistless 
force of public opinion is directed against well- 
nigh every abuse. There is not a New 
Yorker here who from his own experience 
cannot recount the tale of progress. We are 



254 



Charles Evans Hughes 



a well-disposed and a genial people. We 
are not oriven over to bitterness or censorious- 
ness. Scurrilous denunciation has but a limi- 
ted vogue. In every department of official 
life there are men endeavoring to serve the 
State to the best of their ability, and the peo- 
ple are ready to give credit to faithful service. 
But they are also intolerant of faithlessness. 
Throughout the State are manifold evidences 
of determination that the just rights of prop- 
erty shall be protected, that the public rights 
shall be conserved, and that those who repre- 
sent the people shall be held strictly to ac- 
count for the manner in which they discharge 
their trusts. 

The State of New York is equal to its task. 
It daily gathers strength from all the Union. 
In Its success all the States may justly claim a 
share. Steadily It gains in population, in 
wealth. In the diffusion of happiness, and, 
attaining and still seeking to attain, aiming 
always at higher levels of achievement, its 
watchword will ever be " Excelsior." 



XII. 

Address at the Dedication of the Monu- 
ment to General Franz Sigel, New 
York City, October ig, 1907. 

It is our privilege to assemble here in honor 
of a brave soldier who rendered distinguished 
service to his adopted country. In the dedica- 
tion of this monument we pay a fitting tribute 
to his memory. But it is more than a memo- 
rial to courage or to military skill ; it is more 
than a tribute to individual worth. It speaks 
not simply of the service of the accomplished 
officer whose name it bears, but is eloquent of 
the patriotic ardor which has characterized the 
sons of the Fatherland he so worthily repre- 
sented, and of their important contribution to 
our National life. 

General Franz Sig^el was born in Baden in 
1824; he received his military education at 
Carlsruhe and served with distinction in the 
Revolution in 1849. Leaving the land which 
he loved and for whose liberties he had fought, 
he came, an exile, to this country, and after a 

255 



256 Charles Evans Hughes 

few years settled in Missouri, We should en- 
tirely miss the significance of this occasion if 
we did not emphasize the spirit which ani- 
mated this newcomer on American soil. He 
came defeated but not disheartened ; he was 
torn away from the fond associations of his 
youth, but he was not cynical or morose ; he 
did not give himself over to discontent, nor 
was his vitality sapped by vain regrets ; he 
came true to the cause of liberty, with gener- 
ous heart, with vigor and zeal to give the best 
he could bestow to the country which hence- 
forth, by virtue of his manhood's choice, was 
to be not a mere asylum, but a home. And at 
the outbreak of the Civil War, with no less 
zeal for his adopted land than he had shown 
on his native soil, he offered his services to 
the National cause, and in large degree through 
his vigor and efficiency Missouri was saved to 
the Union. 

It is not my purpose to tell the story of his 
career, which may more fittingly be narrated 
by him who is about to address you. His 
military service was extensive and distin- 
guished. He took part in many important 
engagements, and his courage, his military 
ability, and the value of his services to the 
Union cause not only won distinction in the 



General Franz Sigel, 1907 257 

Army but have made his fame secure. Gladly 
we recognize his service, and by this just 
tribute we memorialize the kindliness, the 
courage, and the patriotism of a gallant com- 
mander. 

It is gratifying that the passing of the years 
has not lessened our appreciation of the heroic 
service which preserved our National unity. 
The generation which since the Civil War has 
come upon the scene studies the history of 
that terrific conflict without bitterness, but 
with no lack of reverence for those to whose 
self-denying service we owe the blessing of our 
vigorous National life. The memory of the 
founders and of the saviors of the Republic 
will never fade. As time heals the wounds of 
strife, and as with the extension of our activi- 
ties all parts of our land are more closely knit 
together, we rejoice, in North and South alike, 
with a common pride of country in the splendid 
qualities of manhood which on both sides of 
that struggle were so lavishly displayed. The 
beneficent influence of the heroic and sacrific- 
ing spirit permeates the Nation and is not 
limited by sectional lines. 

Fortunate also is it that we are becoming 
more and more free from racial and provincial 
prejudices, and are able to make a truer esti- 



17 



I 



258 Charles Evans Hug^hes 



&' 



mate of the many sources from which we have 
derived our National strength and the virtues 
of our citizenship. It is a pleasant thought, 
which frequently has been expressed, that 
the ancestors of most of those who settled the 
country in Colonial days once lived in the 
German forests ; and we witness here on a 
large scale, and after centuries of varied ex- 
perience, what is virtually a reuniting of the 
descendants of a common stock. But how- 
ever pleasing this may be to the historical 
imagination, our unity in fact is not racial and 
does not depend upon blood relationship, 
whether near or remote. It is the unity, of a 
common National ideal ; it is the unity of a 
common conception of the dignity of manhood ; 
it is the unity of a common recognition of equal 
civil rights ; it is unity in devotion to liberty 
expressed in institutions designed to give 
every man a fair opportunity for the exercise 
of his talents and to make the activities of 
each subordinate to the welfare of all. To 
the maintenance of this ideal and to the ful- 
filment of the purposes of our National organ- 
ization, each race has made its contribution. 
And we are not truly Americans if we do not 
greatly rejoice in tlie fact that here is more 
than the work of any one people, and more 



General Franz Sigel, 1907 259 

than the product of any one experience ; that 
to the making and to the prosperity of this Com- 
monwealth humanity has given of its best ; 
and that its vigor and unprecedented strength 
are due in no small degree to the fusion of its 
diverse elements. 

There is recalled to us to-day the notable 
influence that our citizens of German birth 
and extraction have had upon our growth 
and development. In Colonial times there 
was a great movement of German immigra- 
tion, largely from the lower Palatinate, which 
resulted in settlements in North Carolina, in 
Maryland, in Virginia, in Pennsylvania, and in 
New York. In our own State the names of 
Herkimer and Palatine recall this early move- 
ment. These settlers were characterized by 
industry, piety, and thrift. Zealous were they 
in defence of the commonwealths to which 
they had joined their fortunes. Notable was 
the service of Germans in the War of the 
Revolution. The names of Steuben, Herki- 
mer, De Kalb, Von Weissenfels, bring freshly 
to our minds our lastinQ" obligation to the sons 
of the Fatherland who fought valiantly in de- 
fence of liberty. Steuben's regulations long 
remained the manual of the United States 
Army and its Militia. De Kalb falling at 



2 6o Charles Evans Huehes 



t)' 



Camden voiced the patriotic sentiment which 
dominated the service of these German pa- 
triots. Dying, he said to a British officer : " I 
thank you for your generous sympathy, but 
I die the death of a soldier fio-htins: for the 
rights of man." 

After the Revolution of 1848 there was a 
notable influx from Germany of men of dis- 
tinguished talent and noble character whose 
lives have made a permanent impression upon 
the Nation. I could not without risk of unin- 
tentional omission, which might be construed 
as showing lack of appreciation, attempt to 
mention all whose advent at this time enriched 
the country. But I may refer to one, the 
soldier and the statesman, the journalist and 
the author, ever true to the cause which he 
espoused in his youth, a leader whose civic 
courage never failed him, and who through a 
long life was conspicuous even more for his 
purity of purpose than for his distinguished 
achievements, whose name will ever be hon- 
ored among us — Carl Schurz. German immi- 
gration during the middle of the last century 
spready largely through the Middle West. 
Those who had struggled for liberty at home 
o^ave themselves freely to the service of the 
Nation. Missouri, Ohio, Illinois, Indiana, 



General Franz Sigel, 1907 261 

Wisconsin, and Kansas have special reason 
to be proud of the patriotism of their German 
citizens. Schurz, Sigel, Bohlen, Hartranft, 
Koltes, Wagner, and Korner may be men- 
tioned as among those whose efforts added 
honor to the German name. 

But we honor to-day not merely German va- 
lor, but the spirit which made that valor possi- 
ble, and those qualities which in peace as well 
as in war have aided in the development of our 
National greatness. In education, in journal- 
ism, in the professions of medicine and law, in 
trade and commerce, in every department of 
activity, and every sphere of philanthropy, our 
citizens of German birth or descent furnish 
constant examples of notable effort and of the 
highest achievement. We can not write any 
chapter of the history of American endeavor 
without doing them honor. But on this 
occasion when we are gathered to set apart a 
memorial of a soldier's service, I would empha- 
size our appreciation of the patriotism of our 
citizens of German origin and their unreserved 
devotion to our National ideals. 

This is our common country. Whatever the 
abode of our ancestors, this is our home and 
will be the home of our children, and in our 
love for our institutions, and in our desire to 



262 



Charles Evans Hughes 



maintain the standards of civic conduct which 
are essential to their perpetuity, we recognize 
no difference in race or creed — we stand 
united, a contented people rejoicing in the 
privileges and determined to meet the re- 
sponsibilities of American citizenship. 



XIII. 

Address at the Charity Organization So- 
ciety, Carnegie Hall, New York City, 
November 19, 1907. 

It is a great pleasure to join in the well- 
deserved congratulations that are appropriate 
to this occasion. In the extraordinary devel- 
opment of our country during the past twenty- 
five years, nothing has been more marked 
than the growth, in extent and intelligence, 
of philanthropic endeavor. And in taking 
account of these efforts there is probably no 
one agency to which higher praise should be 
accorded than to the Charity Organization 
Society. 

Its ministry of relief has had a wide scope. 
It would be difficult indeed to measure the 
value of its direct beneficence. Upon a large 
scale it has been a distributor of alms. In 
countless cases it has brought succor to the 
distressed. It has helped men to help them- 
selves. It has been unremittinc: in its work of 

263 



264 Charles Evans Hughes 

investigating cases of need and of providing 
suitable measures of relief. 

But in a larger view, its greater service has 
consisted in its oro-anization of effort and its 
employment for philanthropic purposes of the 
scientific method. It has soufjht to minimize 
the waste incident to indiscriminate alms- 
giving, and to correlate the forces of benevo- 
lence so as to secure the maximum results. 
How much good purpose fails of important 
result through lack of relation ! And if we 
are to accomplish anything of permanent value 
in our efforts to uplift our fellow men it must 
be wrought through such organized, system- 
atic, and well-directed effort as has characterized 
this Society. 

It is significant that this anniversary should 
be made the occasion of a conference on The 
Betterment of Living Conditions. This im- 
plies no departure from the Society's aim. 
We have too long dealt with effects, leaving 
baleful causes to operate unchecked. This 
Society is a thorough agent of democracy, 
seeking not merely to apply balm to the 
bruises of life, but to eliminate the causes of 
unnecessary injury. 

For we have but little of the true demo- 
cratic spirit if we seek merely freedom of 



Charity Organization, 1907 265 

opportunity that we may aggrandize ourselves, 
and are not keenly zealous for the welfare of 
all, in which indeed lies the true interest of 
each one. They who think they may dwell 
secure in citadels fortified by the gains of 
selfish effort, live in a fool's paradise. Our 
ultimate security must be found in the well- 
being of the people as a whole, and patriotic 
sentiment will not tolerate the continuance 
of unnecessary and remediable conditions to 
which may be traced poverty, vice, and crime. 

We can not but realize that a large portion 
of our brethren are the helpless victims of an 
environment from which they cannot escape, 
and through which they are destined to physi- 
cal misery, moral impoverishment, and econo- 
mic inefficiency. It is our duty patiently 
to consider what can be done not merely to 
afford temporary relief to immediate sufferers, 
but to change the improper environment and 
promote a healthier life. 

Nor do we ask for the impossible or cher- 
ish any Utopian dream of altering, through 
changes in externals, our human nature, with 
its mincrled elements of strencrth and weakness. 

We desire that men should work under 
conditions which will permit a man to do a 
normal man's work. We desire the abatement 



266 Charles Evans Hughes 

of nuisances and such housing of men, women, 
and children that they may live in decency 
and with proper sanitary safeguards against 
the spread of communicable disease. We do 
not wish to see productive energy sapped by 
excessive toil or by labor under improper con- 
ditions. We want men protected from avoid- 
able danger to life and limb, and to see a 
diminution in the shocking number of pre- 
ventable casualities in our industrial employ- 
ments which, it is not too much to say, in the 
light of comparative statistics, constitute a 
disgrace to the country. We want to see the 
lives and health of our children protected, and 
by suitable restrictions upon child labor to 
prevent vitality from being weakened dur- 
ing the period of growth, and an opportunity 
afforded for proper education and prepara- 
tion for the work of life. We seek the 
dissemination of information with reeard 
to the practical conduct of life, so as to 
remove the ills which are due to simple 
icrnorance. 

We wish to brighten and to purify the social 
side of life, to provide means for recreation, 
and to diffuse the opportunities for the refresh- 
ment of those who are bearing heavy burdens 
of daily toil. 



Charity Organization, 1907 267 

We are grateful for the unexampled oppor- 
tunities for individual achievement which our 
country affords. And we desire to remove 
the obstacles in the way of so many of our 
fellow citizens — for which they are in no 
manner responsible — to the enjoyment of 
these opportunities, so that with manhood and 
womanhood unimpaired by preventable evils 
they may really have a chance to make the 
most of themselves. 

This — incompletely stated to be sure — is the 
object of this Society ; and standing for this, it 
claims the gratitude and the support of all the 
people of the State. 

This organization has also very sharply 
drawn the line between what government 
should do and should not do in order to attain 
these ends. It has not attempted to drag the 
State into fanciful schemes for the abolish- 
ment of poverty by act of the Legislature; nor 
has it been guilty of providing opportunities 
for extravagance, favoritism, and corruption 
throuo-h pfovernmental almsofivinor. It has 
created machinery for organized and effective 
effort through private agencies, and thus les- 
sened the appeals to the State for the exercise 
of novel functions. And on the other hand 
it has been a potent influence in securing 



268 Charles Evans Huehes 



t>' 



governmental action where such action was 
appropriate and necessary. 

It has opposed the municipal distribution of 
supplies. The Society could itself far better 
ascertain the wants of the really destitute and 
supply them through private means. It could 
give relief where relief was needed, impartially 
and without pauperizing. And in the success 
of its endeavors to promote and systematize 
private philanthropy, we find it clearly indicat- 
ing the wide scope of the work which is and 
should be undertaken by our citizens without 
recourse to the grovernment. 

What the State can properly do, and has J 

done, is shown in the Tenement House Law, i 

the passage of which was the result of the active 
work of this organization. I am informed that 
decent and reasonably comfortable homes, with 
proper light and ventilation, have been secured, 
under the working of this law, for one million 
people. The activity of the State may also be 
illustrated in the beneficent work of the Labor 
Department, and in the provisions which have 
been enacted for the purpose of securing safe and 
decent places of work, protection from injury, 
and restricting child labor and hours of labor. 
The agency of the municipality is most import- 
ant in providing clean and well-paved streets. 



Charity Organization, 1907 269 

public baths, suitable parks and play-grounds, 
attractive open spaces and recreation piers. 
These in turn are supplemented by the un- 
ceasing work of a large number of our public- 
spirited citizens, who are seeking, through the 
touch of human sympathy and the provision 
of educational and sociable centres of influence, 
to improve the conditions of life. 

The proper regulation and control of public 
service and the provision so far as possible of 
additional transit facilities are of the greatest 
importance in order to relieve congestion and 
to permit men and women to go to and from 
their work in decency and with reasonable 
comfort and convenience. 

This Society has engaged in patient investi- 
gation. It believes that want and misery may 
not only be alleviated in individual cases, but 
that their causes may be diminished. As it 
proceeds in the research it will point out where 
the State has failed to perform its duty, and in 
its intelligent and careful way will not fail to 
be an important factor in securing necessary 
governmental action. Where organized pri- 
vate effort can meet the case, it will endeavor to 
supply it. Of special importance is its work 
in disseminating information and practical in- 
struction. Its work in combating the great 



270 Charles Evans Hughes 



plague of tuberculosis has been most note- 
worthy. Through cards, circulars, and lectures 
it is diffusing the knowledge of preventive 
measures. But with respect to this much re- 
mains to be done ; and it is gratifying to note 
that the people are awakening to an apprecia- 
tion of the extent of this dreadful scourge and 
of the importance of systematic action with 
reference to it. 

I was informed the other day that perhaps 
thirty per cent, of the cases of blindness in 
this State are preventable by the use of simple 
and harmless means ; and by the spread of 
necessary information and the insistence upon 
proper regulations we should greatly diminish 
the numbers of this unfortunate class. 

I have no illusions with reference to the 
future. Laziness, thriftlessness, evil passions, 
and inordinate appetite will continue to wreck 
human lives. But we can replace ignorance 
with knowledofe ; we can orive access to air and 
lieht ; we can build barriers asi'ainst infection ; 
we can keep our city clean, wholesome, and 
attractive ; we can see to it that human beings 
may labor under decent conditions with proper 
consideration for life and health and efficiency; 
and we can make our work for social uplifting 
fruitful and progressive, because each step will 



I 



t 



Charity Organization, 1907 271 

be taken with accurate knowledge based on 
careful investigation, and through harmony of 
effort there will be a minimum of losses. 

But it is of the highest importance that in 
this work of scientific philanthropy our hearts 
should be enlisted. The forces of sentiment 
should not be exhausted in the creation of 
machinery. After all, the most powerful re- 
generating influence is human love, and to 
attain the hio^hest success all our efforts must 
be charged with genuine sympathy and broth- 
erly kindness. It will be a sad day when, to 
prevent the waste of indiscriminate charity, 
the fountains of human generosity are dried 
up and our philanthropy shall consist simply 
of gifts inspired by intellectual considerations. 
Nor should any contemplate the poor as a 
separate class, upon whom alms may be be- 
stowed with lordly condescension and with the 
unction of self-righteousness. Rather, in all 
our organizing work, must we have not only 
discriminating judgment and careful study of 
complex problems, but also true democratic 
fellow-feelinor and hearts full of love for those 
whom we desire to help in the best way, even as 
they are in truth our brothers, of like passions 
with ourselves, and our fellow citizens in this Re- 
public of opportunity and mutual obligation. 



XIV. 

speech at the Opening of the Civic Forum 
at Carnegie Hall, New York City, 
November 20, 1907. 



I 



We have gathered here to install a new 
station for the distribution of currents of in- 
fluential opinion. If we were to ask what is 
most needed to attain the ideals of democ- 
racy, — apart from those moral virtues which 
must condition all else, — we probably should 
desire for its citizens the highest capacity for 
accurate judgment and the freest opportunity 
for the discussion of public questions. For the 
former we look to education, not forgetting 
the great school of experience to whose dis- f 
cipline and variety of instruction in this land of 
opportunity we owe perhaps in largest degree 
what is called the common sense of the Ameri- 
can people. For the discussion of public ques- 
tions we rely chiefly upon the press and the 
platform. 

It is unfortunate, however, that public discus- 
sion is so frequently perverted by self-interest, 



272 



Civic Forum, Nov. 20, 1907 273 

by the temptations of popular agitation, and by 
the exigencies of heated political campaigns. 
It is a delightful thing to give truth the chance 
to emerge in sober discussion where only truth 
is sought. The American people are poorly 
represented by large type and flaming head- 
lines. Their mood is not reflected by the 
shrieking appeals of orators upon the hustings. 
In the main they are a thoughtful and canny 
people, truth-loving and desirous to get at the 
heart of things. Appeals to reason are more 
cogent than many think, and nothing is more 
encouraging than the indications everywhere 
of an intense desire to secure accurate informa- 
tion and to form correct opinions. It is sig- 
nificant that conferences for the interchange 
of opinion and the debate of public questions 
are constantly multiplying ; and I congratulate 
this city upon the opportunities which will 
be afforded by the new lyceum which is now 
opened. 

It has been suororested that in these few 
introductory remarks — which will be far from 
disputatious, for the principles in the applica- 
tion of which I am most interested are so 
simple and obvious that they admit of no dis- 
pute — I should say something regarding the 
idea of public office. 



274 Charles Evans HuQrhes 



Matthew Arnold tells us that conduct is 
three-fourths of life. Certainly the administra- 
tion of office is at least three-fourths of political 
life. And if we could secure the administration 
of every office in accordance with its obliga- 
tions and in adequate fulfilment of the fair 
intent of the Constitution and statutes creating 
it, we should find almost all our problems 
solved. That which is right in our system of 
government would appear revealed in the 
beauty of perfect adaptation, leaving no ex- 
cuse for the use of lesfislative druses to cure 
defects caused by lack of administrative exer- 
cise, and on the other hand such imperfec- 
tions as existed would stand out in such bold 
relief as to leave little room for doubt as to 
the necessary remedy. 

But it is to be expected that the frailties of 
human nature should be exhibited not less but 
rather more in our political relations — in view 
of the many temptations to which they give 
rise — than in otlier activities in which they are 
made so familiar. We are only men, and 
nothing human is alien to the public officer. 
He may be somewhat steadied by responsi- 
bility and safeguarded by precedent ; he may 
be to some extent sanctified by some worthy 
tradition or inspired by some noble example. 



Civic Forum, Nov. 20, 1907 275 

But in o-eneral the administration of office will 
reflect the average virtues and failings of the 
community. 

We must, therefore, constantly emphasize 
official obligation and ever hold up to view 
the true democratic ideal of office. We suffer 
to no slieht extent from the survivals of no- 
tions of office which are entirely foreign to our 
governmental system. For example, there con- 
tinually persists the notion of power drawn 
from ancient despotism converting in a small 
way, and as opportunity may offer, the servants 
of the people with defined duties into their 
would-be masters acting with arbitrary dis- 
regard of oblicration. More common, how- 
ever, is the feudal notion of allegiance to some 
chance lord or sub-lord by whose grace the 
office is believed, and frequently truly believed, 
to be held. From this point of view the people 
are recognized only to the extent necessary to 
capture the requisite majority of votes. But 
for all other purposes the conduct of office is 
determined by the will of some individual or 
group of individuals to whom the incumbent 
owes his temporary distinction. 

But most mischievous of all perhaps is the 
idea derived from the American love of achieve- 
ment and individual success. It is so commonly 



276 Charles Evans Huo^hes 



expected that every opportunity will be availed 
of to the utmost to promote the success of the 
individual who has the opportunity. It is 
American to get on in the world and to let 
no chance escape ; and so it is not regarded as 
a matter for surprise but rather the action is 
too readily condoned, that a man will make 
use of ofifice, not of course in the manner 
usually called corrupt and which would bring 
him within the observations of the penal code, 
but in every other way to further his individual 
fortunes. 

Now, against the notion of arbitrary power, 
against that of subservience to any authority 
other than his constituency, against every use 
of official opportunity for personal ends, the 
American people must set the democratic ideal 
of office, and for their own protection must 
hold their representatives strictly accountable 
for every departure from it. The democratic 
idea of office is that it is a place of designated 
service ; that the offi.cer is not chosen to gfve 
him opportunity for personal advantage, but 
to do certain things defined in the Constitution 
and statutes to the best of his ability because 
it is necessary that those things should be done 
and well done for the benefit of the people. 

In connection with the larger part of ad- 



Civic Forum, Nov. 20, 1907 277 

ministratlve work there is no room for the 
controversies of political platforms. There 
are simply specified tasks. These tasks 
may be created and defined with reference 
to political policy, but once created and 
defmed there is little room for disagreement 
as to the manner in which they should be 
performed. 

We shall never attain the full measure of 
our opportunity in this country until the mean- 
ing of trusteeship sinks deep into the Ameri- 
can consciousness and its realization controls 
our activities both in business and in political 
affairs. It must seize the conscience of the 
directors of corporations, working conviction 
of the disgraceful perfidy of abusing their op- 
portunities as trustees for stockholders in order 
to make personal fortunes. Few indeed are 
they who in any large enterprise deal ex- 
clusively with their own. What we call the 
" world of modern business " is simply a gigan- 
tic series of sacred fiduciary obligations. The 
lesson of to-day, both in business and in politics, 
is the lesson of fidelity to trust. 

No system of government is complete which 
does not provide some method of calling public 
ofificers to account for the manner in which 
they discharge their duties. Varied provision 



278 Charles Evans Hughes 

is made for this purpose, from the trial of 
impeachments to summary removal. 

Of the highest importance are the provisions 
for enforcing the accountability of local officers. 
The greater part of administration is local. It 
is that which most closely affects our immediate 
interests. If local administration in our various 
communities is pure and capable, there will be 
no difficulty in securing the proper conduct of 
higher office, for vigilant citizenship begins its 
work at home. 

The local officer is elected by the majority 
of the local community, but he is not the of- 
ficer of that majority. He owes to all the 
citizens faithful service according to his duty. 
The minority cannot quarrel with the choice 
of the majority, but the man selected by the 
majority must do his duty. The majority 
have no right to keep in office a faithless 
official. Governor Tilden stated it as one of 
the essential conditions of self-government : 

" That while the responsibility of public officers to the 
voting citizens be made effective, and they be made 
amenable to the taxpayers of the locality through the 
courts, accountability to the State be preserved through 
regular methods, so that the existence of such appeal of 
the minority and of individuals against the wrongs of 
governing officials will render unnecessary and inex- 
cusable the frequent legislative interventions which have 



Civic Forum, Nov. 20, 1907 279 

practically destroyed all self-government, created more 
local mischief than they have remedied, and have grown 
to be prolific of abuse and corruption in the legislative 
bodies." 

In accordance with the plan adopted in this 
State, the Constitution provides for the re- 
moval by the Governor, upon charges and after 
a hearing, of specified local officers elected by 
the people. And statutes have provided simi- 
lar methods of accountability in connection 
with various local officers not mentioned in 
the Constitution. 

In actinof in such matters the Governor ex- 
ercises an extraordinary power, and his exercise 
of it is not reviewable; but it was felt that 
the power to require accountability should be 
lodged somewhere; and while in this State, in 
the cases of certain minor judicial officers, the 
power of removal is lodged with designated 
courts, and in the case of higher judicial officers 
with the Leeislature, and in the case of most 
officers appointed by the Governor, with the 
advice and consent of the Senate, it is lodged 
with the Senate, on the recommendation of the 
Governor, — in the case of important local offi- 
cers charged with the enforcement of the law 
it is placed solely with the Governor. And this 
power, as has been said, is to be exercised by 



28o Charles Evans Hughes 

the Governor upon charges and after a hearing. 
That is to say, it is the intent of the constitu- 
tional provision, and of the statutory provisions 
modelled upon it, that charges shall be pre- 
sented against a local officer which specify in 
a suitable manner dereliction of duty warrant- 
ing removal, that due hearing be had, and that, 
in order to justify the removal, the charges 
shall be found to be sustained. While the 
action of the Governor, under the decision of 
our Court of Appeals, is not reviewable by the 
courts, he necessarily acts not arbitrarily, but 
under the gravest responsibility. 

Thus the quality of the administration of 
local officers lies with the citizens of the com- 
munity. They will have good or bad adminis- 
tration as they insist on the former or are 
content with the latter. If the laws are violated, 
or if administrative duties are not performed, ^ 

it may be brought to the attention of the 1 

local of^cer concerned. If he fails to do * 

his duty, charges may be laid before the 
Governor, as provided in the Constitution 
and statutes. 

This is the manner in which, with reference 
to local administration, the Chief Executive is 
able to secure enforcement of the laws. The 
duty of direct enforcement lies with the local 



Civic Forum, Nov. 20, 1907 281 

officers responsible to the people who elected 
them. They are scattered through the sixty- 
one counties of the State, and it is manifestly 
impossible for the Executive to supervise 
these numerous administrations directly save 
as dereliction is presented in the constitu- 
tional manner. But by availing themselves 
of the remedies afforded, our citizens may hold 
their officers to proper accountability and se- 
cure the conduct of ofiice in reasonable fulfil- 
ment of its obligations. 

I find no cause for discouragement. I be- 
lieve that our citizenship was never more alert 
and insistent upon maintaining proper stand- 
ards of efficient administration than to-day. 
And I believe it would be difiicult to point to 
a time when a larger proportion of public 
ofiicers were striving honestly to do their 
duty. In demanding justice we must not for- 
get to do justice. Nothing is gained by mak- 
ing suspicion do duty for facts. The tendency 
to a cynical and censorious spirit in our citizen- 
ship should be checked. Especially unworthy 
is such a spirit in those who pose as the 
prophets of reform. The first qualification of 
any one who would seek to secure better ad- 
ministration is entire candor and the spirit of 
fair play. I want no more to do with the man 



282 Charles Evans Hughes 

who will spread false accusation or without 
good just-basis of fact will endeavor to give 
currency to aspersions upon public officers, 
than with those who are faithless to their trust. 
There is no health in either. If you have the 
facts which show that a public officer is dere- 
lict, you have no need for innuendo and you 
may, and should, press your case relentlessly 
albeit with pity in your heart. But if you 
have not the facts, then be fair, and let your 
suspicions justify your search and your rigid 
inquiry, but nothing more until the facts, and 
all the facts, are found. 

In estimating the duties of officers we in- 
sist, and must increasingly insist, upon work 
proportioned to the exigency; upon admin- 
istration suited to the responsibilities of the 
office. We must have efiiciency ; that is to 
say, we must insist that those things which are 
comprehended within the duty of the office, 
and upon attention to which the welfare of the 
people depends, shall be done, and that the 
community shall not be mocked by counterfeit 
administrations. To this end we must con- 
stantly labor, and by seeking to enlarge the 
interest of the people in the workings of the 
government, by popularizing methods of selec- 
tion of candidates, by aiming in all depart- 



Civic Forum, Nov. 20, 1907 283 

ments to secure the best service for the State, 
and by holding all officers to strict accounta- 
bility, we may hope to come more closely to 
the realization in practical administration of 
the democratic idea of an office. 



XV. 

Speech at the Meeting in the Interest of 
Tuskegee Institute, Held at Carnegie 
Hall on the Evening of January 17, 
igo8. 

We are here to-night to emphasize our in- 
terest in the work that is beinor done for the 
benefit of our fellow citizens of the black race. 
From a proper viewpoint it is a work for our 
own benefit as well. It is essential to the in- 
terests of the people as a whole. 

We can never afford to lose sieht of the 
fundamental objects alike of enlightened self- 
interest, of philanthropy, and of patriotism. 
These are first, to give opportunity and stim- 
ulus so that each man may make the most of 
himself ; further, to stimulate that wholesome 
interest in the welfare of our fellows which will 
make usefulness and service the standards of 
our activities, and without which talent and 
trained skill are prostituted to ignoble and cor- 
rupt purposes ; and still further, to see that our 

laws and our administration of laws shall secure 

284 



Tuskegee Institute, Jan. 17, 1908 285 

equality of civil rights, shall protect the gains 
of honest effort, and shall make the field of our 
labors a fair one in which talent and industry 
shall have a chance on their merits free from 
all preventable oppression. 

These aims are not sectional nor do they 
concern exclusively any race or any portion of 
our population. They are the aims of a free 
people and they must be constantly emphasized 
with regard to all, white and black, whatever 
their occupation or antecedents. He is a bold 
man who would attempt to forecast the destiny 
of any people. A few centuries ago the an- 
cestors of most of us were living a savage life 
in the forests of northern Europe. We have 
been fortunate in opportunities for free and 
independent effort and have attained a high 
degree of civilization, which at a time not long 
remote, if we consider the period of recorded 
human history, would have been beyond the 
bounds of prophecy. We have reason for 
pride in what has been accomplished. But we 
take little account of the past if we do not con- 
stantly strive to widen the area of opportunity 
and to do all in our power to promote the de- 
velopment, raise the standards, and to increase 
the efficiency of those who have been denied 
our own advantages. 



286 Charles Evans Hughes 

The black man is entitled to his chance. He 
is entitled to the advantacfes of training and 
education. He is entitled, under the stimulus 
of free institutions, to an opportunity to prove 
by his works what is in him, and to make his 
contribution, according- to his talent and apti- 
tude, to the sum of our productive labors and 
of our National life ; and he is entitled to the 
rewards which his character and industry may 
deserve. There Is no color line in crood work, 
whether of hand or brain. Good work, trained 
skill, and sterling integrity are the same irre- 
spective of race, color, or previous condition of 
servitude. The effort should be likewise irre- 
spective of race, to increase the efficiency, to 
produce the skill, and to develop the charac- 
ter. For this purpose there is guaranteed 
the equality of civil rights, and nothing should 
be left undone to make provision for education, 
and for training of mind and character. It has 
well been said that whatever problem the pro- 
gress of the negro may present, it is not com- 
parable with that which will be presented by 
stagnation or retrogression. In this land the 
door of opportunity must be wide open to our 
citizens. We want neither slaves nor serfs, nor 
any body of citizens permanently below the 
standards which must be maintained for the 



Tuskegee Institute, Jan. 17, 1908 287 

preservation of the Republic. We cannot 
maintain our democratic ideals as to one set of 
our people and ignore them as to others. 

One of the most characteristic features of 
recent progress is that preparation for active 
life becomes more definite and less haphazard. 
On every hand new opportunities are being 
provided to fit men for some useful work. 
These are made necessary by the conditions 
of modern life and the necessity of special 
preparation with regard to a constantly in- 
creasine number of tasks. The best stimulus 
to industry is the ability to do something 
well ; and the greatest temptation to shift- 
lessness is the lack of any apparent opportunity 
for usefulness. 

The widening of the sphere of educational 
work is shown not simply in provision for 
technical training, but notably in connection 
with agriculture. There is a widespread de- 
mand for elementary and practical instruction 
in farming and kindred subjects, a demand 
which is likely in time to affect profoundly our 
system of public instruction. As a leading 
educator said to me yesterday : " It is proba- 
ble that in the future our boys will be prepared 
not simply for the office, but will be taught 
how to live in the country." 



288 Charles Evans Hughes 



C>' 



In this provision for necessary instruction 
to enable men to make the most of themselves 
in every field of activity, the negro must have 
a generous share. It must be a share propor- 
tioned to his need. It is because that at Tus- 
kegee such important work has been done for 
the training of the negro, work, the accom- 
plishment of which puts us under lasting obli- 
oration to the distingruished founder and director 
of the institution, that we are here to-night. 
We desire that this work shall be continued ; 
that those who have been there trained for 
leadership shall have abundant opportunity in 
other schools to follow this example. The 
record of the institution is eloquent of the 
results which may be reached by intelligent 
effort. And in wishing Godspeed to this 
work we express our interest in the work of all 
other institutions which are honestly striving 
to provide these much-needed opportunities. 

In providing them we do not desire simply 
to get the products of labor, simply to increase 
the wealth of the country, by adding to the sum 
of effort. Economic motives are well enough. 
But this country is not a mere wealth-produc- 
inor machine. None of its problems can be 
solved if its people are treated merely as parts 
of an industrial mechanism. It is a country of 



Tuskegee Institute, Jan. 17, 1908 289 

men, with the aspirations and the dignity of 
manhood. The fundamental requirement is 
self-respect, upon which character and the 
highest efficiency necessarily depend. And 
with respect to white and black, conditions 
which promote the wholesome feeling of per- 
sonal honor and individual worth are alone the 
conditions which will secure lasting benefits 
for our society and the solution of the grave 
problems which confront it. 



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